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PROPHETS 


•Rilllli 


THE  WAR  fcf  THE  PROPHETS 


THE  WAR 
THE  PROPHETS 


NOTES  ON  CERTAIN  POPULAR  PREDICTIONS 
CURRENT  IN  THIS  LATTER  AGE 

BY 

HERBERT  THURSTON,  SJ. 


MavTis  apwrros  ocrrts  eiKafci  /caXto? 


LONDON : 

BURNS    fef    GATES    LTD. 

28,   ORCHARD   STREET,   W. 

1915 


PREFACE 


HIS  little  book,  dealing  with  the  pro- 
phecies current  during  or  recalled  to 
memory  by  the  present  war,  has 
been  suggested  at  least  in  part  by 
Dollinger's  well-known  essay,  Der 
Weissagungsglaube  und  das  Prophetenthum  in 
der  christlichen  Zeit,  of  which  an  excellent  trans- 
lation was  published  forty  years  ago  by  Mr. 
Alfred  Plummer.  Dr.  Dollinger's  survey  dealt 
almost  exclusively  with  the  predictions  of  the 
Middle  Ages;  the  present  work  concerns  itself 
with  those  prognostics  which  have  attracted  atten- 
tion in  recent  times,  and  are  expected  to  find 
their  fulfilment  in  our  own  generation.  Even 
Dollinger,  in  spite  of  his  strongly  antipapal 
standpoint,  did  not  think  of  questioning  the 
possibility  of  a  genuine  gift  of  prophecy,  whether 
natural  or  infused.  He  believed,  for  example, 
that  Savonarola  possessed  it,  although  by  no 
means  all  Savonarola's  predictions  were  justified 
by  the  sequel.  Naturally  it  is  not  the  aim  of  the 
following  pages  to  show  that  credibility  is  to  be 
denied  on  principle  to  every  attempt  to  foretell 
future  events.  St.  Paul  writes,  as  we  all  know  : 


VI 


Preface 


"  Despise  not  prophecies,  but  prove  all  things, 
hold  fast  that  which  is  good  "  (i  Thess.  v.  20-21) ; 
and  although,  as  Lightfoot  well  notes,  the  mean- 
ing of  7rpo<£r?Teia  in  the  New  Testament  is  "  forth- 
telling  rather  than  foretelling,"  inspiration,  in 
other  words,  rather  than  prediction,  still  the 
latter  sense  is  also  implicitly  included.  That 
there  have  been,  and  are,  many  persons  to  whom  a 
knowledge  of  the  future  is  imparted  in  ways  that 
transcend  our  comprehension,  I  fully  believe. 
But  that  this  knowledge  ever  extends  to  the 
foreseeing  of  political  events  of  general  interest 
is  very  difficult  to  establish  by  evidence.  It  does 
not  seem  to  be  part  of  the  divine  dispensation 
that  assurance  regarding  the  decrees  of  Provi- 
dence should  be  given  to  any  considerable  body 
of  mankind.  Certainly  a  careful  scrutiny  of  such 
pretended  oracles  as  are  discussed  in  the  present 
volume  must  lead  to  an  attitude  of  extreme 
suspicion  in  regard  to  all  literature  of  this  type. 
Of  the  many  hundred  predictions  recorded  in  the 
various  collections  which  I  have  examined  almost 
all  have  been  long  ago  refuted  by  the  actual 
course  of  events.  I  have,  in  fact,  come  across 
but  one,  and  that  a  prophecy  to  which  attention 
has  not  hitherto  been  directed,  which  seems  to 
me  to  retain  the  least  semblance  of  intrinsic 
probability  (see  pp.  80-84  below).  Moreover,  even 
here  the  extrinsic  evidence  is  quite  unsatisfactory, 
and  should  the  terrible  catastrophe  foreshadowed 
unhappily  come  anywhere  near  realization,  one 


Preface  vii 

could  feel  no  confidence  that  we  were  in  the 
presence  of  anything  more  than  a  rather 
exceptional  coincidence. 

Although  the  longest  chapter  in  this  volume, 
that  concerned  with  the  pretended  "  prophecy  of 
St.  Malachy,"  may  seem  at  first  sight  to  have 
little  to  do  with  the  present  war,  the  observant 
reader  will  soon  discover  that  these  papal  mottoes 
are  closely  interwoven  with  the  fabric  of  nearly 
all  the  recent  religious  predictions  concerning 
present  calamities  and  the  end  of  the  world.  It 
therefore  seemed  desirable  to  discuss  the  ques- 
tion of  the  fraudulent  origin  of  the  list  in  some 
detail,  the  more  so  that  much  that  is  written  on 
the  subject  is  curiously  ill-informed.  The  sub- 
stance of  the  chapter  dealing  with  St.  Malachy  is 
taken  from  two  articles  which  I  contributed  to 
The  Month  as  far  back  as  June  and  July,  1899, 
where  the  intimate  dependence  of  the  mottoes 
on  Panvinio  was,  I  think,  made  clear  for 
the  first  time.  The  fact  that  even  in  such 
a  work  as  The  Catholic  Encyclopedia  the 
"  prophecy  "  should  be  treated  as  a  document  of 
serious  value  seemed  to  render  it  needful  to  deal 
with  the  subject  somewhat  more  fully  and 
exhaustively  than  the  matter  in  itself  deserved. 

March  3ist,  1915. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  I 

PAGE 

PROPHECY  IN  1870-1  i 

CREDULITY  at  seasons  of  popular  excitement 
— The  war  of  1870 — Vogue  of  the  Voix  Pro- 
phetiques  and  of  other  similar  collections — 
Blessed  Catherine  of  Racconigi — Anna  Maria  Taigi 
and  the  three  days  of  d'arkness — Madeleine  Poisat 
and  Maximin  of  La  Salette — The  famous  prophecy 
of  Orval — Henry  V,  the  "  Offspring  of  the  Cap  " — 
A  suggested  alliance  for  Queen  Victoria — The  Orval 
prophecy  an  avowed  forgery — The  failure  of  Mary 
Lataste — The  prophecy  of  Blois — King  George's  "isle 
of  captivity." 

CHAPTER  II 
THE  PROPHETS  AND  ECCLESIASTICAL  AUTHORITY      26 

PROTESTS  of  Father  de  Buck  and  Mgr.   Du- 
panloup — The     fifth     Council     of     Lateran — 
Mgr.    Douais — The  Question  of  Imprimaturs 
— The  Saint  of  Toulouse — Supposed  Prophecy  of  the 
Cure"  D'Ars  ;  its  real  meaning — Unsatisfactoriness  of 
the  evidence — The  "  Feast  of  our  Lady  "  an  inter- 
polation— The  Dom  Bosco  fabrication. 

CHAPTER  III 
"  BROTHER  JOHANNES  " 47 

TEXT  of   the   Prophecy— The  Antichrist— The 
Battle  of  the  Beasts — Incredible  profusion  of 
detail — Sar  P61adan  and  his  extravagances — 
A  free-and-easy  editor — Madame  Faust  and  M.  P61a- 
dan's  recitation — The  strange  omissions  of  Brother 
Johannes — Prediction    attributed   to    St.    Thomas   of 
Canterbury — Other  Beast  prophecies. 


x  Contents 

CHAPTER  IV 

PAGE 

ARMAGEDDON  AND  THE  END  OF  WAR     ...         ...       68 

THE   Battle  of  the  Birch  Tree — Jaspers — The 
bogus    Prophecy    of    Mayence — Hermann    of 
Lehnin — The  Polish  vision  of  Blessed  Andrew 
Bobola — The  predictions  of  a  modern  Carmelite  nun 
— "  Till    only    the    fourth    part   of   men    remain  " — 
Flaws  in  the  evidence — A  letter  to  an  English  priest. 

CHAPTER  V 
DIVINERS  AND  SOOTHSAYERS       ...         ...         ...       90 

AN  arithmetical  prognostic  of  the  year  of  the 
Kaiser's  downfall — Such  cabbalistic  divina- 
tions no  novelty — Louis  Napoleon's  fatal 
year — An  illustration  from  the  eighteenth  century — 
The  numerical  significance  of  Pius  papa  nonus — 
The  methods  of  Zadkiel  and  Old  Moore — "  Men 
marke  when  they  hit  and  never  marke  when  they 
misse  " — Some  modern  horoscopes — The  commercial 
value  of  a  gift  of  reading  the  stars — Madame  de 
Thebes — Nostradamus — A  Mother  Shipton  fabrica- 
cation — The  death  of  a  sovereign  correctly  foretold. 

CHAPTER  VI 

THE  SO-CALLED  "  PROPHECY  OF  ST.  MALACHY  "     120 

VOGUE  of  St.  Malachy's  papal  mottoes- 
How  first  published — Triviality  and  purpose- 
less character  of  the  interpretations — Funda- 
mental difference  between  the  mottoes  which  pre- 
cede and  those  which  follow  the  date  of  publica- 
tion— Vagueness  and  ready  adaptability  of  the  later 
oracles — The  Pope  book  of  Panvinio — This  book 
unquestionably  used  for  the  fabrication  of  the 
mottoes — Overwhelming  evidence  which  proves  this 
assertion — Panvinio's  blunders  of  1557  incorporated 
in  St.  Malachy's  supposed  prophecy  of  1142 — 
Origin  of  the  forgery — Theories  of  Weingarten  and 
Harnack — Grounds  for  rejecting  them — The  Popes 
still  to  come  and  the  inferences  drawn  from  their 
mottoes. 


Contents  xi 

CHAPTER  VII 

PAGE 

THE  FATE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  THE  COMING  OF 

ANTICHRIST  ...  ...     142 

NATI  ON  AL  prophecies — Nostradamus  predicts 
300  years  of  maritime  empire  for  England 
— An  English  revolution  also  foretold 
— Mile.  Couedon — Bartholomew  Holzhauser  and 
England's  reconversion  to  the  Faith — Prophecy 
of  St.  Edward  the  Confessor — Antichrist  accord- 
ing to  the  Ascension  of  Isaiah — Adso's  great 
Emperor  of  Prankish  race — Roger  Bacon's  Papa 
Angelicas — The  two  ideas  combined  in  the  later 
mediasval  legends — St.  Vincent  Ferrer  on  the  near 
approach  of  the  end  of  the  world — Antichrist  already 
born — St.  Francis  of  Paolo's  supposed  prophecy — 
Holzhauser  and  many  other  mystics  predict  for  the 
Church  a  period  of  peace  and  triumph  which  is  to 
precede  Antichrist — Conflicting  views  regarding  the 
date  and  order  of  the  events  which  herald  the  second 
coming  of  Christ. 


THE  WAR  AND  THE 
PROPHETS 


CHAPTER  I 

PROPHECY  IN  1870 — 1871 

ErERY  schoolboy  is  familiar  with  the 
portents  which  in  the  pages  of  Livy 
are  noted  as  occurring  in  profusion 
at  seasons  of  special   danger  and 
calamity  in  the  history  of  the  republic. 
But  even  Livy,  respecter  of  traditions  as  he  was, 
did   not  disguise  his  misgivings  regarding  the 
authenticity  of  many  of  the  preternatural  occur- 
rences which  he  thought  it  incumbent  upon  him  to 
record.    Thus  it  is  that  at  a  breathing  space  in 
his  chronicle  of  the  second   Punic  war  he  re- 
marks :    "  At   Rome  or  in   the   neighbourhood 
many  portents  occurred  that  winter,  or,  as  often 
happens  when  once  men's  minds  are  affected  by 
religious  fears,  many  were  reported  and  thought- 
lessly believed."1     There  can  in  any  case  be  no 

1  Livy,  Lib.  xxi,  cap.  62.  "  Romae  aut  circa  urbem  multa  ea 
hieme  prodigia  facta,  aut,  quod  evenire  solet  motis  semel  in 
religionem  animis,  multa  nuntiata  et  temere  credita  sunt." 
Cf.  xxii  i  and  36 ;  xxiii  32  ;  xxiv  10  and  44,  etc. 


2  Prophecy  in  1 870-7 1 

doubt  that  an  atmosphere  of  excitement  and' 
unrest  is  singularly  favourable  for  the  propaga- 
tion of  credulities  of  all  kinds.1  We  need  not 
exactly  call  it  nerves,  that  is,  if  nerves  be  sup- 
posed to  be  synonymous  with  a  condition  of 
abject  terror.  There  is  often  no  terror;  terror 
in  fact  is  the  effect  rather  than  the  cause.  But 
there  is  a  loss  of  mental  balance,  a  disposition 
to  clutch  at  straws,  an  inability  to  observe  any 
outward  object  without  magnifying  it  tenfold, 
and  we  must  believe  that  this  attitude  of  mind 
is  distinctly  unhealthy.  It  may  at  times  be  a 
stimulus,  but  a  stimulus  which  is  followed  by  a 
regrettable  reaction.  The  more  we  can  maintain 
an  attitude  of  robust  common  sense  the  better 
for  ourselves  and  for  our  neighbours.  Our 
British  phlegm,  which  is  not  perhaps  nowadays 
quite  so  distinctively  British  a  characteristic  as  it 
used  to  be,  is  a  valuable  asset  at  times  such  as 
these. 

I  am  led  to  make  these  reflections  by  the 
indications  which  meet  us  on  so  many  sides  just 
now  of  a  general  disposition  to  credulity,  not 
only  with  regard  to  statements  of  fact  and 
horrors  committed  in  the  war,  but  also  with 
regard  to  predictions  concerning  the  future.  At 
the  time  of  the  great  Franco-Prussian  contest  of 
1870 — 1871  there  was  a  positive  epidemic  of  pro- 

1  Dollinger,  Prophecies  and  the  Prophetic  Spirit,  Eng.  trans., 
pp.  89-90,  points  out  how  rife  prophecies  were  upon  the  dis- 
turbed soil  of  Italy,  and  also  how  they  multiplied  during  the  time 
of  the  Great  Schism  ;  ib.,  p.  152. 


"Voix  Prophetiques  "  3 

phecies,  especially  on  the  French  side.  A  certain 
Abbe  Curicque,  a  member  of  various  learned 
societies,  compiled  a  work,  which  in  its  fifth 
edition,  published  in  1872,  filled  more  than 
thirteen  hundred  pages  with  vaticinations  sup- 
posed to  refer  to  our  present  age.1  Though  a 
large  proportion  of  these  utterances  profess  to 
have  emanated  from  canonized  saints  or  from 
persons  in  repute  of  holiness,  it  would  be  im- 
possible to  find  a  single  item  which  could  have 
given  a  clue  to  any  event  known  to  have  hap- 
pened since  the  book  was  published,  or  which 
was  even  likely  to  be  helpful,  except  in  the  most 
general  way,  to  readers  in  search  of  moral 
edification.  For  the  most  part  the  predictions 
are  obscure  and  hopelessly  elusive.  Notwith- 
standing their  Christian  origin  they  are  not  one 
whit  more  easy  of  interpretation  than  the  oracles 
of  pagan  Delphi.  If  ever  they  seem  to  offer  a 
definite  indication  of  something  capable  of  in- 
vestigation, they  either  prove  to  have  been 

1  Voix  Prophdtiques,  ou  Signes,  Apparitions  et  Predictions 
Modernes  touchant  les  grands  6"v£nements  de  la  Chretientd  au 
XI Xe  siecle  et  vers  I'approche  de  la  Fin  des  Temps,  par  1'Abbe" 
J.  M.  Curicque,  Membre  de  la  Socie'te'  d'Arche'ologie  et  d'Histoire 
de  la  Moselle,  etc.,  5th  ed.,  2  vols.,  Paris:  Palm6,  1872.  A 
vast  number  of  similar  books  appeared  about  the  same  time, 
e.g.,  Pere  Marie  Antoine,  Le  Grand  Pape  et  le  Grand  Roi,  7th 
ed.,  Toulouse,  1872  ;  V.  de  Stenay,  Le  Prophete  David 
Lazzeretti,  Paris,  1872  ;  F.  Roux,  Examen  de  la  Prophetic  de 
Blois,  Paris,  1871  ;  Colin  de  Plancy,  La  Fin  des  Temps,  Paris, 
1871  ;  V.  de  Stenay,  L'A-venir  devoiU,  Paris,  1870,  1871  ;  A.  Le 
Pelletier,  La  Clef  des  Temps ;  G.  N'aquet,  Europe  Delivree, 
Paris,  1871  ;  etc.,  but  it  would  be  useless  to  attempt  a 
bibliography. 


4  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

falsified  by  subsequent  events,  or  when  com- 
pared with  one  another,  they  lead  us  to  contra- 
dictory conclusions.  A  more  unprofitable  task 
than  that  of  the  editor  who  with  great  labour 
gathered  up  these  Voix  Prophetiques,  it  would 
be  impossible  to  imagine. 

Without  attempting  to  furnish  any  account  of 
the  heavenly  portents  with  which  the  book  is 
filled — the  apparitions  of  saints,  the  moving 
statues,  the  testimony  of  possessed  persons,  the 
armies,  crosses  and  serpents  seen  in  the  air,  the 
menacing  aspect  of  the  aurora  borealis,  the 
shocks  of  earthquake,  the  dried-up  fountains  that 
began  to  flow,  etc.,  etc.1 — all  of  which  are  repre- 
sented as  full  of  prophetic  significance,  one  or 
two  brief  illustrations  may  be  given  of  utterances 
in  which  the  prophet,  or  more  probably  the 
prophet's  interpreters,  have  been  sufficiently  ill- 
advised  to  venture  upon  definite  statements  and 
dates.  For  the  most  part  the  works  of  canonized 
saints,  for  example,  St.  Bridget,  St.  Gertrude, 
St.  Theresa,  St.  Leonard  of  Port  Maurice,  etc., 
which  are  laid  under  contribution,  furnish  no 

1  As  a  mere  matter  of  curiosity  it  may  be  interesting  to  trans- 
late the  headings  of  the  chapters  of  Book  V,  they  correspond  to 
pp.  401-53  of  vol.  i  (in  the  4th  ed.)  and  bear  the  general 
title  "  Prophetic  Signs  in  the  Elements."  The  chapters  run  as 
follows  :  i,  The  Torrent  of  the  Carceri  of  St.  Francis  of  Assisi ; 
2,  The  overflow  of  the  Tiber  ;  3,  The  intermittent  spring  of 
Darbres  ;  4,  The  Aurora  Borealis  of  Oct.  24th  and  25th,  1870  ; 
5,  The  cross  of  light  around  the  moon  on  the  night  of  December 
8th  ;  6,  The  monster  serpent  seen  in  the  air  at  Jarny,  near 
Metz ;  7,  The  battle  in  the  sky  at  the  village  of  Golaze  in 
Poland  ;  8,  Three  military  scenes  witnessed  in  the  heavens  by 
observers  in  the  Rhineland  ;  9,  The  e'arthquake  in  Tibet. 


Anna  Maria  Taigi  5 

more  than  general  premonitions  of  calamity  for 
the  Church,  which  might  belong  to  any  age  or 
any  combination  of  circumstances.  But  some  of 
the  utterances  of  persons  in  repute  of  sanctity 
are  represented  as  being  more  explicit.  Thus  we 
learn  that  Blessed  Catherine  of  Racconigi 
announced,  before  1544,  that  after  three  centuries 
had  elapsed,  a  descendant  of  Francis  I,  King 
of  France,  should  rule  over  the  world  like  a 
second  Charlemagne.1  There  is  a  little  difficulty 
here,  since  the  male  line  of  Francis  I  came  to  an 
end  with  Henry  III,  but  the  editor  thinks  it 
obvious  that  the  royal  house  of  Bourbon  in 
general  must  be  meant,  and  the  partisans  of  the 
Comte  de  Chambord  were  consequently  left  free 
to  derive  all  encouragement  from  this  prediction 
of  a  universal  Christian  monarchy.  Unfor- 
tunately we  have  come  to  the  end  of  almost  four 
centuries  since  Blessed  Catherine  prophesied, 
and  the  advent  of  the  second  Charlemagne  seems 
as  far  off  as  ever.  The  Venerable  Anna  Maria 
Taigi,  according  to  the  Voix  Prophetiques,  was 
much  more  precise.  She  announced  that  the 
pontificate  of  Pius  IX  would  last  twenty-seven 
years.2  He  was  in  fact  Pope  for  nearly  thirty- 
two  years.  Moreover,  she  very  definitely  asserted 
that  he  would  live  to  see  the  triumph  of  the 
Church  in  spite  of  all  the  calamities  that  would 
previously  come  upon  the  world.  Indeed  we 

1    Voix  Prophetiques,  vol.  ii,  p.  100, 
1   Voix,  ii,    167. 
6 


6  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

have  quite  a  minute  description  of  all  the  occur- 
rences which  would  then  take  place  : 

All  the  enemies  of  the  Church,  hidden  or  open,  will 
perish  during  the  days  of  darkness  with  the  exception 
of  some  few  whom  God  will  convert  immediately 
afterwards. 

The  air  will  then  be  infected  by  the  demons  who 
will  appear  under  all  kinds  of  hideous  shapes.  The 
possession  of  a  blessed  candle  will  secure  its  owner 
from  death,  so  also  will  the  saying  of  prayers 
addressed  to  our  Blessed  Lady  and  the  holy  angels. 

After  the  days  of  darkness,  Saints  Peter  and  Paul 
having  come  down  from  heaven,  will  preach  through- 
out the  world  and  will  designate  the  new  Pope, 
Lumen  in  Coelo,1  who  is  to  succeed  Pius  IX.  A 
great  light  will  flash  from  their  bodies  and  will  settle 
upon  the  cardinal,  the  future  pontiff. 

Saint  Michael  the  Archangel,  appearing  then  upon 
earth  in  human  form,  will  hold  the  devil  enchained 
until  the  period  of  the  preaching  of  Antichrist. 

In  these  days,  Religion  shall  extend  its  empire 
throughout  the  world.  There  shall  be  "  one 
Shepherd."  The  Russians  will  be  converted,  as  well 
as  England  and  China,  and  all  the  faithful  will  be 
filled  with  joy  in  beholding  this  overwhelming 
triumph  of  the  Church. 

After  the  days  of  darkness,  the  Holy  House  of 
Loreto  will  be  carried  by  the  angels  to  Rome  and 
will  be  deposited  in  the  basilica  of  Saint  Mary  Major." 

1  This,  of  course,  is  a  reference  to  the  so-called  prophecy  of 
St.  Malachy,  which  is  discussed  later  on  in  chapter  vi. 

2Voix  Prophttiques  (5th  ed.,  1872),  vol.  ii,  pp.  170-1.  (3rd 
ed.,  1871)  pp.  342-3. 


Madeleine  Poisat  7 

I  am  far  from  asserting,  or  even  believing, 
that  the  Venerable  Anna  Maria  Taigi  was  her- 
self the  author  of  this  rubbish.  But  when  the 
cause  of  her  Beatification  was  being  pressed 
forward  at  Rome,  these  things  were  attributed 
to  her,  and  they  do  not  seem  to  have  been 
repudiated  by  those  who  were  officially  associated 
with  the  inquiry.  Certain  it  is,  in  any  case,  that 
what  I  have  just  quoted  appears  in  the  third, 
fourth,  and  fifth  editions  of  the  Voix,  and  that 
this  last  was  not  only  recommended  by  letters 
from  Bishops,  but  published  with  the  express 
approbation  of  ecclesiastical  authority.  It  must, 
of  course,  be  remembered  that  all  this  saw  the 
light  while  the  humiliation  of  France  and  the 
loss  of  the  temporal  power  were  yet  recent,  and 
when  Pius  IX  had  still  six  or  seven  years  of  life 
before  him.  The  same  reflection  explains  the 
tone  of  a  document  which  the  editor  of  Les  Voix 
declares  to  have  been  submitted  to  the  Fathers  of 
the  Vatican  Council1  as  a  revelation  vouchsafed 
to  a  holy  mystic  named  Madeleine  Poisat.  Here 
are  a  few  sentences  : 

Peter  have  confidence.  The  ark  outrides  the  storm 
and  there  follows  a  great  calm.  Pius  IX  is  the  last 
Pope  of  the  Church  oppressed,  "  Cross  of  the 
Cross  "  (Crux  de  Cruce).*  Pain  for  him  but  also 
joy.  After  him  comes  deliverance.  Lumen  in  coelo 
(Light  in  the  heaven).  It  is  the  eye  of  Mary. 

1   Voix,  ii,  476. 

3  Another  reference  to  the  Malachy  prophecy. 


8  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

Within  the  Church  itself  they  will  think  that  all  is 
lost.  Mary  appears  and  lo !  there  is  confusion, 
confusion  even  among  priests. 

And  the  seer  goes  on  to  explain  that  with  the 
coming  of  Mary  all  will  be  converted,  even  the 
Jews  and  the  Pharisees. 

Of  similar  import  is  the  so-called  "  secret  "  of 
Maximin  Giraud,  the  shepherd  boy,  who,  with 
M&anie,  was  the  witness  of  the  apparitions  of 
La  Salette.  The  Editor  of  Les  Voix  professes 
to  print  from  a  copy  made  by  the  Venerable 
Pierre  Eymard,  the  holy  founder  of  the  Society 
of  the  Blessed  Sacrament,  whose  name  is  intro- 
duced as  if  he  thus  made  himself  guarantee  for 
the  authenticity  of  Maximin 's  pretended  secret. 
Without  quoting  the  whole  we  may  note  these 
events  which  will  follow  upon  the  loss  of  faith  by 
three-quarters  of  the  population  of  France  : 

A  Protestant  nation  of  the  north  will  be  converted 
to  the  faith,  and  by  means  of  this  nation  the  other 
nations  will  return  to  the  faith. 

The  Pope  who  shall  come  after  the  present  Pope, 
Pius  IX,  will  not  be  Roman  (ne  sera  pas  romain, 
which  might  either  mean  that  he  would  not  be  of 
Roman  birth,  or  that  he  would  have  to  establish  his 
episcopal  see  elsewhere). 

When  men  are  converted  God  will  restore  peace  to 
the  world. 

Afterwards  this  peace  will  be  overthrown  by  the 
Beast  (le  monstre). 

And  the  Beast  will  come  at  the  end  of  the  nineteenth 
century  or  at  latest  at  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth. 


The  La  Salette  Shepherd  Boy  9 
So  that  we  have  apparently  the  conversion  of 
England  ( ?),  the  conversion  of  the  world,  a  non- 
Roman  pope,  profound  peace,  and  only  after  all 
these  things,  the  coming  of  the  Beast  who  is  to 
upset  the  peace.  None  the  less,  the  Beast  is  to 
arrive  at  latest  at  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth 
century  ! 

Such  were  the  prophecies  which  were  widely 
circulated  and  greedily  swallowed  during  the 
period  of  mental  and  political  disturbance  which 
followed  upon  the  Franco-Prussian  War.  Need- 
less to  say  that  there  were  many  which  were 
understood  to  have  a  more  direct  reference  to  the 
final  outcome  of  the  drama  which  was  then  being 
enacted  on  the  soil  of  France.  Though  Paris 
had  capitulated  before  the  end  of  January,  1871, 
some  time  had  still  to  elapse  before  the  treaty  of 
peace  was  signed  and  a  still  longer  period  before 
the  German  garrisons,  left  behind  to  ensure  the 
payment  of  the  indemnity,  were  entirely  with- 
drawn from  French  territory.  This  was  of  all 
others  the  season  most  fertile  in  prophecies  of  a 
forthcoming  divine  intervention.  The  Germans, 
it  was  believed,  would  manufacture  some  excuse 
for  invading  the  country  a  second  time.  In 
punishment  for  the  infidelities  and  crimes  which 
had  culminated  in  the  horrors  of  the  Commune, 
Paris  would  again  become  the  prey  of  the  enemy 
and  would  be  almost  entirely  destroyed  by  fire. 
But  when  the  humiliation  of  the  French  capital 
was  complete,  God  would  come  to  the  aid  of  His 


io  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

faithful  servants.  A  great  leader  would  arise, 
whom  every  Legitimist  identified  with  the 
Bourbon  claimant,  the  Comte  de  Chambord. 
He  would  reign  as  king  by  the  name  of  Henri 
V,  and  to  the  white  standard  which  he  unfurled 
all  good  Frenchmen  would  rally.  The  wicked 
would  be  exterminated,  or  else  be  converted,  and 
the  cause  of  Catholic  Christianity  would  every- 
where triumph.  It  was  under  the  inspiration  of 
ideas  such  as  these  that  the  prophecy  attributed 
to  the  Cure*  d'Ars  was  disseminated  in  1871-2. 
With  this  it  will  be  necessary  to  deal  more  at 
length  in  a  future  chapter.  In  the  meantime  let 
me  copy  the  latter  portion  of  the  much-debated 
"  Prophecy  of  Orval,"  which  more  perhaps  than 
any  other  augury  gave  encouragement  to  the 
supporters  of  Henri  V. 

The  Prophecy  of  Orval  was  originally  circu- 
lated as  an  ancient  prediction  which  had  been 
printed  at  Luxemburg  in  1544.  A  copy  of  this 
booklet,  it  was  said,  chanced  to  be  preserved  in 
the  neighbouring  monastery  of  Orval  (Aurea 
Vallis),  and  was  thence  made  public  in  1793. 
But  others  contented  themselves  with  asserting 
more  vaguely  that,  whatever  its  origin,  the  text 
was  at  least  known  to  be  in  existence  in  the 
monastery  before  the  French  Revolution.  The 
document,  as  we  have  it,  begins  with  the  rise  of 
the  great  Napoleon  and  describes  his  career 
somewhat  minutely.  Seeing  that  the  earliest 
printed  copy  dates  only  from  1839,  this  is  not 


The  Prophecy  of  Orval  1 1 

very  convincing,  neither  is  one  more  impressed 
by  the  fairly  accurate  presentment  of  the  reigns 
of  Louis  XVIII  and  Charles  X  (1815-30),  which 
almost  certainly  had  already  ended  when  the 
document  first  saw  the  light.  The  interest,  of 
course,  begins  with  what  is  obviously  intended 
to  be  a  forecast  of  the  events  after  1830;  and 
here,  as  the  unprejudiced  reader  will  clearly  dis- 
cern, the  prophet  to  all  appearance  knew  nothing 
whatever  of  the  Second  Empire,  but  believed 
that  after  Louis  Philippe1  had  reigned  a  few 
years  he  would  be  overthrown  by  another  revolu- 
tion. Then  this  new  democracy,  according  to 
the  forecast,  would  itself  end  in  a  period  of 
terrible  war  and  desolation,  which  would  in  turn 
be  succeeded  by  the  glorious  rule  of  a  legitimist 
monarch  under  whom  the  Church  would  triumph. 
Dates  are  not  very  clearly  indicated,  but  the 
prophet  seems  to  have  believed  that  the  Revolu- 
tion, which  he  foresaw  and  which  actually  came 
in  1848,  would  last  about  ten  years.  After  that 
he  announced  a  purification  by  great  calamities, 
which  was  to  be  followed  by  a  sort  of  golden  age 
in  which  a  Bourbon  king  ("  the  offspring  of  the 
Cap,"  i.e.,  a  descendant  of  Hugh  Capet)  would 
bring  prosperity  bc+h  to  France  and  to  the 
Church.  Apostrophizing,  then,  under  the  name 
of  "  Sons  of  Brutus,"  the  Revolutionaries  who 
were  to  depose  Louis  Philippe,  the  prophet  goes 
on  : 

1  He  is  clearly  indicated  under  the  phrase  "  Roi  du  Peuple." 


12  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

22.  Howl,    ye   sons    of    Brutus !     Call    upon    the 
beasts  that  are  going  to  devour  you.     Great  God  ! 
what  a  clash  of  arms  !     A  full  number  of  moons  is 
not  yet  completed,  and  behold,  many  warriors  are 
seen  coming  ! 

23.  The  time  is  over.     The  desolated  mountain  of 
the  Lord  [the  seven  hills  on  which  Rome  is  built]  has 
cried  unto  God.     The  sons  of  Juda  [the  Bourbons ; 
the  kings  of  Israel  were  of  the  tribe  of  Juda]  have 
cried  to  God  from  the  foreign  land,  and  behold,  God 
is  no  longer  deaf. 

24.  What   a   fire   accompanies   his   arrows  !     Ten 
times  six  moons  [five  years]  and  again  six  times  ten 
moons   [five  other  years,   or   altogether   ten  years] 
have  fed  his  anger. 

25.  Woe  to  thee  great  city  !  [presumably  Paris]. 
Behold,  there  are  many  kings  armed  by  the  Lord,  but 
fire  has  already  levelled  thee  to  the  ground ;  yet  the 
just  will  not  perish,  God  has  mercy  upon  them. 

26.  The  abode   of  crime  is   purified   by   fire;   the 
great  river  [the  Seine]  carries  its  waters  all  crim- 
soned   with    blood    to    the    sea,    and    Gaul,    nearly 
dismembered,  will  be  reunited. 

27.  God  loves  peace.     Come  young   Prince,   quit 
the  island  of  captivity.     Listen ;  unite  the  lion  and 
the  white  flower — come  ! 

28.  What  is  foreseen  is  the  wish  of  God.     The 
old  blood  of  past  centuries  will  again  terminate  long 
contentions,  because  then  one  sole  pastor  will  be  seen 
in  Celtic-Gaul. 

29.  The  man,  powerful  through  God,  will  be  firm 
on  his  throne,   and   many   wise  laws  will   establish 
peace.     The  offspring  of  the  Cap  will  be  so  prudent 
and  wise  that  God  will  be  thought  with  him. 


The  Conversion  of  England         1 3 

30.  Thanks  to  the  Father  of  mercies  the  Holy  Sion 
proclaims  again  the  glory  of  one  great  God. 

31.  Many  lost  sheep  come  and  drink  at  the  living 
stream;  three  kings  and  princes  cast  off  the  mantle 
of  error  [heresy]   and  see  plainly  the  true  faith  of 
God. 

32.  At  that  time  two  third-parts  of  a  great  people 
of   the   sea    [England   and   Scotland,    Ireland   being 
Catholic  already]  will  return  to  the  true  faith. 

33.  God  is  again  blessed  during  fourteen  times  six 
moons  [seven  years],  and  six  times  thirteen  moons 
[about  six  years,  or  altogether  thirteen  years]. 

34.  God  is  weary  of  having  granted  His  mercies ; 
nevertheless,    for   the    sake    of    His    elect    He   will 
prolong  peace  during  ten  times  twelve  moons  [ten 
years]. 

35.  God  alone  is  great !     All  good  is  done ;  the 
saints  are  going  to  suffer.     The  man  of  evil  arrives, 
born  of  two  races. 

36.  The  white  flower  becomes  obscured  during  ten 
times  six  moons  [five  years],  and  six  times  twenty 
moons  [ten  years,  or  altogether  fifteen  years],  and 
then  disappears  for  ever  ! 

37.  Much  evil  and  little  good  in  those  times ;  many 
cities  perish  by  fire. 

38.  Then  Israel  comes  to  God  Christ  for  good  and 
all. 

39.  The    accursed    schismatics    and    the    faithful 
people  will  be  separated  into  two  camps.   But  the  time 
is  over.     God  alone  will  be  believed  in,  and  the  third 
part  of  Gaul,  and  again  the  third  part  and  a  half,  will 
be  without  any  creed. 

40.  It  will  be  the  same  with  other  nations. 

41.  And  behold,   already  six  times  three  moons, 


14  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

and  four  times  five  moons  [altogether  about  three 
years]  have  passed  since  all  things  have  been 
separated,  and  the  last  century  has  begun. 

42.  After  a  number  not  completed  of  moons,  God 
combats  through  his  two  just  ones,  but  the  man  of 
evil  conquers.  But  all  is  over !  The  high  God  has 
placed  a  wall  of  fire  before  my  understanding,  and 
I  can  see  no  more. 

We  who  now  read  this  incoherent  rhodomon- 
tade  in  cold  blood  find  it  difficult  to  restrain  our 
impatience.  It  seems  incredible  that  Frenchmen 
and  Frenchwomen  of  intelligence  can  have 
pinned  their  faith  to  it  as  a  supernatural  revela- 
tion. And  yet  in  France  after  the  war  there 
were  literally  scores  of  books  written  to  vindicate 
its  authenticity  and  to  interpret  its  oracles  as  those 
of  a  sacred  text.1  Many  pious  writers  took  it 
simply  for  granted,1  while  others  busied  them- 
selves in  calculating  the  moons  and  speculating, 
for  example,  upon  the  identity  of  the  three 
Kings  who  were  to  cast  off  the  mantle  of  heresy. 

1  It  would  be  useless  to  attempt  any  catalogue,  but  the 
following  two  books  may  be  cited  as  typical  specimens  :  Albert 
de  Bee,  Henri  V  (le  grand  monarquc)  Restaurateur  du  Trdne  et 
des  Gloires  de  la  France  et  80  ans  de  revolutions  annonce"s  et 
jug<!s  par  les  proprieties,  Paris,  1871  ;  Abbe"  E.  A.  Chabauty, 
Lettres  sur  les  Prophttties  modernes  et  Concordance  de  toutes 
les  predictions  jusqu'au  regne  d'Henri  V,  Poitiers,  1871.  Both 
these  works  went  through  more  than  one  edition.  In  another 
still  more  extravagant  book,  the  Abb6  H.  Torn6-Chavigny 
maintained  that  the  real  author  of  the  Prophecy  of  Orval  was 
Nostradamus ;  see  Lettres  du  Grand  Prophete  (Paris),  1870, 
pp.  32  and  153. 

1  See,  for  example,  Huguet,  Paris  ses  Crimes  et  ses  Ch&ti- 
ments  (Lyons),  pp.  81  and  94. 


"The  Offspring'of  the  Cap  "        1 5 

As  all  were  agreed,  the  phrase  "  Woe  to  thee, 
great  city,"  obviously  referred  to  Paris,  bom- 
barded first  of  all  by  the  enemy  and  then  set  on 
fire  by  the  Commune.  Not  less  unmistakably, 
so  the  same  commentators  insisted,  was  "  the 
offspring  of  the  Cap  "  (i.e.,  the  descendant  of 
Hugh  Capet)  who  "  joined  the  lion  to  the  white 
flower,"  to  be  identified  with  the  person  of  the 
Comte  de  Chambord,  Henri  V.  None  the  less, 
in  1871,  when  he  had  attained  the  age  of  51,  it 
was  not  easy  to  understand  how  he  could  be 
apostrophized  as  "  Young  Prince";  while,  on 
the  other  hand,  when  the  prophecy  was  given 
to  the  world  before  1839  the  phrase  would  have 
been  natural  enough,  for  the  prospects  of  the 
boy  known  as  the  Comte  de  Chambord  were 
already  being  discussed.  The  solitary  feature  in 
the  document  which  could  even  for  a  moment  be 
suspected  of  betraying  any  preternatural  insight 
into  the  future  is  the  curious  prediction,  "  At 
this  time  two-thirds  of  a  great  people  of  the  sea 
will  return  to  the  true  faith."  No  Frenchman 
in  1832,  it  might  be  thought,  could  have  dreamed 
of  such  a  religious  phenomenon  as  the  Oxford 
movement.  But  promising  as  this  utterance 
might  have  seemed  amid  the  enthusiasm  of  the 
"  Second  Spring,"  not  even  the  conversion  of 
England,  still  less  that  of  the  three  sovereigns, 
has  yet  been  realized ;  while  the  Comte  de  Cham- 
bord has  been  in  his  grave  for  thirty  years  and 
the  Pope  is  still  a  prisoner  in  the  Vatican. 


1 6  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

Nothing  perhaps  could  more  effectively  illus- 
trate the  worthlessness  of  all  this  class  of  pro- 
phecies than  the  fact  that  already  in  the  course 
of  sixty  years  three  successive  interpretations 
have  been  adopted  to  determine  the  identity  of 
this  young  Prince  "  the  offspring  of  Hugh 
Capet."  In  the  'fifties  a  verification  was  sought 
in  the  dynasty  of  Napoleon  III,  and  commen- 
tators were  at  pains  to  persuade  their  readers  that 
the  Prince  Imperial  and  his  mother  the  Empress 
Eugenie  could  claim  through  the  family  of 
Medina  Coeli  to  be  descended  from  Blanche,  the 
daughter  of  St.  Louis  ;*  and  now  again  when  the 
hopes  of  the  Chambord  legitimists  have  suffered 
shipwreck  there  are  still  writers,  incredible  as  it 
may  appear,  who  cling  to  the  Orval  prediction, 
pointing  out  that  "  Louis  XVII  is  still  repre- 
sented at  the  present  moment  (this  was  written 
in  1910)  by  six  grandchildren,  the  sons  of 
Prince  Edmond  and  Adalbert  de  Bourbon."2 
According  to  M.  Tisserant,  then,  the  young 
prince,  the  offspring  of  the  Cap,  is  still  to  come. 
None  the  less,  to  any  impartial  man  who  has  the 
patience  to  look  into  the  question  of  the  prophecy 
of  Orval,  it  must  be  perfectly  plain  that  the 
document,  though  possibly  incorporating  older 
materials,  was  deliberately  fabricated  about  the 
year  1832.  The  date  is  determined  with  all 

1  See  Jeantin,  Les  Ruines  et  les  Chroniques  de  I'Abbaye 
d' Orval  (Paris,  1857),  p.  224,  note. 

3  H.  Tisserant,  Void  I'Heure,  8th  ed.  (Nancy,  1910),  p.  44, 
note. 


A  Confession  of  Fraud  17 

desirable  accuracy  by  the  language  of  paragraph 
27  :  "  Come,  young  prince,  quit  the  island  of 
captivity.  Listen,  unite  the  lion  and  the  white 
flower."  From  1830  to  1832  the  youthful  Henri 
V,  who  was  10  years  old  in  1830,  was  residing 
in  Great  Britain,  and  there  was  at  that  time 
every  probability  that  he  would  continue  to  live 
there.  It  can  hardly  be  doubted  that  by  the 
"  island  of  captivity  "  the  prophet  meant  Great 
Britain,  and  that  by  the  union  of  "  the  lion  and 
the  white  flower  "  (fleur-de-lys)  he  intended  to 
suggest  the  desirability  of  a  matrimonial  alliance 
between  Henri  V  and  the  Princess  Victoria,  the 
future  Queen  of  England. 

The  two  facts,  in  any  case,  of  which  we  have 
certain  knowledge  are  these :  First,  that  no 
printed  text  of  the  Prophecy  of  Orval  has  ever 
been  produced  which  is  older  than  1839;  and 
secondly,  that  in  1849  the  Bishop  of  Verdun 
published  a  letter  in  which  he  condemned  the 
Prophecy  of  Orval  as  a  fraud,  declaring  that  the 
fabricator  was  a  priest  of  his  own  diocese  who 
under  pressure  of  a  juridical  examination  had 
confessed  his  guilt.1 

In  spite  of  the  grief  caused  by  such  a  scandal,  I 
have  [wrote  the  Bishop]  at  least  had  the  consolation 
of  obtaining  from  the  mouth  of  the  culprit  himself  a 
complete  admission  of  his  fault.  He  declared  to  me, 
in  fact,  that  the  little  book  printed  at  Luxembourg 

1  This,  we  learn,  was  a  certain  Abbe1  Henri  Dujardin  who 
compiled  a  collection  of  prophecies  in  1840,  to  which  he  gave  the 
name  of  L'Oracle, 


1 8  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

in  I5441  had  never  existed,  except  in  his  own  imagina- 
tion, that  the  portion  about  the  Empire  [he  means, 
of  course,  the  first  Empire,  of  Napoleon  I]  was 
entirely  his  work,  that  the  rest  had  been  pieced 
together  at  random  from  scraps  of  ancient  pro- 
phecies, borrowed  from  various  out-of-the-way 
collections,  with  regard  to  which  I  pronounce  no 
opinion,  that  at  the  first  he  had  no  other  intention 
in  perpetrating  this  fraud  than  just  to  amuse  him- 
self, but  that  when  some  of  his  predictions  chanced 
to  come  true,  he  had  been  led  on,  partly  by  vanity, 
partly  by  false  shame,  to  persist  in  a  deception  from 
which  he  is  now  glad  to  be  rescued.1 

It  is  abundantly  evident  that  such  a  letter 
could  not  have  been  written  and  published  in  the 
newspapers,  if  the  confession  of  guilt  spoken  of 
therein  had  not  been  authentic.  The  Abb6 
H.  Dujardin,  the  priest  thus  incriminated,  was 
living  at  the  time  and  made  no  protest.  He  was 
well  known  to  have  identified  himself  with  the 
prophecy  in  print,  and  though  the  Bishop  does 
not  actually  mention  his  name,  he  indicates  him 
clearly  by  initials  as  "  M.  D.  .  .  .  Cur6  de 
B.  .  .  ."  But  in  spite  of  all  this,  as  has  been 
already  noticed,  the  prophecy  was  not  only 

1  In  the  preface  to  the  early  copies  of  the  Prophecy  of  Orval 
this  prediction  Was  said  to  be  contained  in  a  little  book  published 
in  1544. 

a  At  the  time  the  Bishop's  letter  was  penned  the  fullest  pub- 
licity was  given  to  it.  It  appeared  in  most  of  the  Catholic 
newspapers,  and  notably  in  the  Journal  de  Bruxelles,  March 
igth,  1849.  Both  this  letter  and  the  original  preface  to  the 
Prophecy  of  Orval  may  be  found  in  Migne,  Dictionnaire  des 
Prophtties,  ii,  727.  Cf.  Precis  Historiques  (Brussels,  1870), 
vol.  xix,  p.  485. 


Marie  Lataste  19 

revived  in  1870,  finding  thousands  of  enthusiastic 
defenders,  but  it  has  also  retained  its  credit  with 
some  strangely  constituted  intelligences  down  to 
our  own  day. 

A  word  or  two  may  be  added  about  another 
prophecy  which  was  much  discussed  in  1871-2, 
that  of  Marie  Lataste,  lay-sister  of  the  Congre- 
gation of  the  Sacred  Heart.  The  prediction  is 
in  any  case  noteworthy  on  this  ground,  that  we 
possess  beyond  reasonable  doubt  the  actual 
words  of  the  mystic,  not  only  dictated  by 
herself  at  a  date  prior  to  the  coming  to  pass  of 
any  of  the  events  discussed,  but  published  sub- 
sequently with  ecclesiastical  approbation.  The 
exact  year  of  the  revelation  cannot  be  assigned, 
but  it  must  have  happened  upon  some  feast  of 
the  Immaculate  Conception  prior  to  1843.  Marie 
Lataste  believed  that  on  this  occasion  she  was 
told  by  our  Saviour  that  it  was  His  will  that  the 
doctrine  of  the  Immaculate  Conception  should 
be  proclaimed  on  earth  and  acknowledged  by  all 
Christians.  Our  Lord  then  added :  "  I  have 
chosen  to  Myself  a  Pope  and  I  have  inspired 
him  with  this  resolution.  He  will  ever  have  this 
thought  in  his  mind  from  the  time  that  he  shall 
be  Pope.  He  will  collect  together  the  Bishops 
of  the  whole  world  that  their  voices  may  be 
heard  proclaiming  Mary  Immaculate  in  her  Con- 
ception." Then  Marie  Lataste  learnt  from  the 
same  preternatural  source  that  "  affliction  shall 
reign  in  the  city  which  I  love  "  [presumably 


2o  Prophecy  in   1870-71 

Rome].  "This  city  will  seem  to  succumb 
during  three  years,  and  a  little  longer  after  these 
three  years.  But  My  Mother  shall  descend  into 
the  city ;  she  will  take  the  hands  of  the  old  man 
seated  on  a  throne  and  will  say  to  him,  '  Behold 
the  hour !  arise,  see  thy  enemies,  I  cause  them 
to  disappear  one  after  another,  and  they  dis- 
appear for  ever.  Thou  shalt  live,  and  I  will  live 
with  thee.  Old  man,  dry  thy  tears;  I  bless 
thee.'  "l 

Now  it  is  unquestionable  that  Pius  IX,  who 
was  elected  in  1846,  had  the  definition  of  the 
Immaculate  Conception  much  at  heart,  and  that 
he  carried  out  his  purpose  in  1854.  Of  course, 
he  may  have  known,  and  been  influenced  by, 
this  prediction  of  Marie  Lataste,  but  even  so, 
the  rapid  fulfilment  of  the  prophecy  is  sufficiently 
striking.  Consequently  when  the  papal  govern- 
ment was  overthrown  in  1870  and  Victor  Em- 
manuel became  master  of  Rome,  those  who 
remembered  the  holy  lay-sister's  words  were 
confident  that  after  the  lapse  of  three  years  the 
Sovereign  Pontiff  would  triumph  over  his 
enemies  and  that  the  temporal  sovereignty  would 
be  restored  to  him.  At  about  this  period  a  new 
edition  of  Marie  Lataste's  writings  and  revela- 
tions was  published  with  episcopal  approbation, 
and  the  Vicar-General  of  the  diocese  of  Aire 
(M.  Guitton),  together  with  another  theologian, 

1  E.  Healy  Thompson,  Life  of  Marie  Lataste  (1877),  pp. 
103-4,  and  Letters  and  Writings  (Eng.  ed.,  1881),  vol.  i,  p.  156. 


The  Test  which  Failed  2 1 

committed  themselves  in  print  to  the  statement 
that  for  both  of  them  "  the  decisive  test  of  the 
truth  of  her  prophecies  will  be  the  triumph  of 
the  present  Pope  and  the  deliverance  of  Rome."1 
Unfortunately  the  test  failed ;  not  only  Pius  IX, 
but  two  of  his  successors,  have  passed  to  their 
reward,  and  the  triumph  is  apparently  as  far  off 
as  ever.  Even  the  most  robust  champions  of 
Marie  Lataste's  prophetic  gifts  must  surely  by 
this  time  have  had  their  faith  somewhat  shaken. 
Hardly  less  popular  at  the  same  epoch  was  the 
so-called  Prophecy  of  Blois.  If  we  could  really 
trust  the  correctness  of  the  text,  which  is  sup- 
posed to  have  been  communicated  verbally  to 
Mile,  de  Leyrette,  afterwards  known  as  Mere 
Providence,  by  an  Ursuline  Touriere  of  Blois, 
called  Sceur  Marianne,  in  1804,  the  prediction 
would  be  a  very  remarkable  one ;  for  many  of  its 
paragraphs  seem  to  accord  minutely  with  events 
which  happened  in  1820,  1830,  and  later  on. 
But  it  is  just  here  that  the  evidence  is  most 
unsatisfactory.  Mere  Providence  was  under  the 
impression  that  she  had  been  forbidden  to  write 
down  any  of  the  things  that  Sceur  Marianne  had 
told  her.  Consequently  we  have  to  trust  to  the 
memory  of  other  members  of  the  Blois  Com- 
munity who  had  heard  some  of  the  disconnected 
utterances  which  Mere  Providence  had  passed 
on  to  them  by  word  of  mouth.  In  1870,  when 
this  prophecy  first  began  to  attract  attention, 

1  E.  H.  Thompson,  Life  of  Marie  Lataste,  p.  340, 
C 


22  Prophecy  in  1870-71 

Mere  Providence  herself  was  93  years  old  and 
incapable  of  giving  any  exact  account  of  what 
she  had  heard  sixty-six  years  before.  But  the 
general  drift  of  the  predictions  pointed  to  a 
happy  consummation  in  the  near  future,  when 
France,  after  a  period  of  desolating  war  and 
revolution,  would  enter  upon  a  golden  age  of 
peace.  For  example  : 

Such  wonderful  things  will  happen  that  the  most 
sceptical  will  be  obliged  to  say  that  the  finger  of 
God  is  here. 

You  will  sing  a  Te  Deum;  but  talk  of  Te 
Dennis  \ — I  tell  you  that  it  will  be  such  a  Te  Deum 
as  has  never  been  sung  before. 

It  will  take  fifteen  or  twenty  years  for  France 
to  recover  from  her  calamities. 

However,  things  will  settle  down,  and  up  to  the 
time  of  perfect  peace,  until  France  shall  have 
become  more  prosperous  and  tranquil  than  ever 
was  known,  some  twenty  years  will  roll  by. 

The  triumph  of  religion  will  be  such  that  no  one 
has  ever  before  seen  its  like.  All  wrongs  will  be  set 
right,  the  laws  of  the  State  will  be  brought  into 
harmony  with  those  of  God  and  the  Church,  the 
education  given  to  children  will  be  thoroughly 
Christian,  and  the  guilds  for  workmen  will  be  every- 
where restored.1 

Alas  !  not  twenty,  but  forty,  years  have  sped 
by  since  the  epoch  of  the  calamities — those  of 

1  See  especially  F.  Roux,  Examen  de  la  Prophdtie  de  Blois 
(Paris,  1871),  p.  33  ;  and  Richaudeau,  La  Prophetic  de  Blois 
avec  des  Eclair cissements  (4th  ed.,  Tours,  1872).  Cf.  Precis 
Historiques  (1871),  p.  91. 


The  Prophecy  of  Blois  3  3 

18701,  which  every  commentator  then  declared 
to  be  the  "  grands  e"ve"nements  "  directly  foretold 
by  the  prophetess — but  the  golden  age  of  peace 
and  the  triumph  of  French  Christianity  has  not 
yet  arrived. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  Prophe*tie  de 
Blois,  which  in  its  more  approved  form  is  a 
document  of  no  great  length,  owed  much  of  its 
vogue  to  a  certain  dramatic  picturesqueness 
which  characterizes  it.  Speaking  apparently  of 
the  great  conflict  which  was  to  precede  the 
triumph  of  the  Church,  Soeur  Marianne  declared  : 

You  will  have  to  pray  hard,  for  the  wicked  will 
seek  to  destroy  everything.  Before  the  great  battle 
they  will  be  masters ;  they  will  do  all  the  harm  they 
can,  but  not  all  they  want  to  do,  for  they  will  not 
have  time. 

The  great  battle  will  be  between  the  good  and 
the  wicked ;  it  will  be  awful ;  the  firing  of  the  cannon 
will  be  heard  for  nine  leagues  round. 

The  good,  being  inferior  in  numbers,  will  be  on 
the  point  of  being  exterminated ;  but — oh  the  power 
of  God  !  oh  the  power  of  God  ! — the  wicked  will  all 
perish.  "  Do  you  mean  that  all  the  wicked  will 
perish,  dear  Marianne?  "  asked  Mile,  de  Leyrette. 
"  Yes,  and  many  of  the  good  as  well." 


When  all  is  over  three  messengers  will  come. 
The  first  will  brings  news  that  all  is  lost.  The 
second,  who  will  arrive  at  night  time,  will  find  only 
a  single  man  leaning  against  his  doorway.  "  You 


24  Prophecy  in   1870-71 

are  very  hot,  my  friend,"  this  man  will  say  to  him, 
' '  get  down  and  have  a  glass  of  wine. "  "  I  am  in 
too  much  of  a  hurry,"  the  messenger  will  reply;  and 
then  he  will  ride  on  towards  Le  Berry. 

You  will  all  be  at  meditation  when  you  will  hear 
that  two  messengers  have  gone  past;  but  then  a 
third  will  arrive,  fire  and  water,1  who  will  tell  you 
that  the  day  is  won ;  but  he  will  have  to  be  at  Tours 
in  an  hour  and  a  half. 

There  were  many  other  prophecies  in  circula- 
tion in  the  days  of  the  Franco-Prussian  War, 
but  we  may  be  satisfied  with  having  touched 
upon  those  which  were  most  widely  discussed. 
At  the  present  time  I  note  that  the  Prophecy  of 
Orval  still  figures  in  a  little  brochure  (undated, 
but  from  its  contents  obviously  compiled  or 
revised  since  the  great  war  of  1914  began)  which 
is  now  being  sold  in  Paris.3  Anna  Maria  Taigi 
and  the  Nun  of  Blois  apparently  offered  nothing 
which  the  compiler  found  to  his  purpose,  but 
from  the  Orval  prediction  he  has  extracted  one 
sentence  as  bearing  upon  the  present  situation  : 

Come,  young  prince,  leave  the  isle  of  captivity ; 
unite  the  lion  to  the  white  flower. 

This,  the  reader  will  be  pleased  to  learn,  is 
now  interpreted  as  an  invitation  to  his  gracious 
Majesty  King  George  V  to  unite  under  his 

1  The  commentators  are  agreed  that  the  good  sister  Marianne 
used  this  phrase  in  1804  to  convey  that  the  news  would  come  by 
train,  a  manner  of  locomotion  she  was  unable  to  explain  other- 
wise. The  distance  from  Blois  to  Tours  is  about  35  miles. 

3  Les  Predictions  sur  la  Fin  de  I'Allemagne,  Editions  et 
Librairie,  Rue  de  Seine  40,  Paris,  fr.i.50. 


The  Island  of  Captivity  25 

leadership  the  armies  of  France  and  Belgium.1 
But  why  King  George's  island  should  be  an 
"  island  of  captivity  "  is  a  problem  which  is 
unfortunately  left  without  explanation  of  any 
sort. 

1  Predictions  sur  la  Fin  de  I'Allemagne,  p.  ai. 


CHAPTER    II 

THE  PROPHETS  AND  ECCLESIASTICAL  AUTHORITY 

IT  must  not  be  supposed  that  the  flood 
of  prophetic  literature  of  which  we  have 
just  been  speaking  was  allowed  to  cir- 
culate entirely  without  protest.     Already 
in     1870,    before    the    Franco-Prussian 
War   had   been    more   than   a    month    or   two 
in    progress,    a   series   of   able   articles,    which 
rumour  correctly  attributed  to  Father  Victor  de 
Buck,  S.J.,  the  distinguished  Bollandist,  began 
to  appear  in  the  Precis  Historiques  of  Brussels.1 
Not    only    did    the    writer    himself    deprecate 
strongly  the  credulity   with   which  these  pro- 
phecies  were   too   commonly   received,    but   he 
appealed  to  the  praiseworthy  example  of  pru- 
dence set  by  certain  other  religious  periodicals 
which  had  not  allowed  themselves  to  be  sucked 
into  the  vortex.     Still  more  important  was  the 
pronouncement  of  the  famous  Bishop  of  Orleans, 
Mgr.   Dupanloup,  who  since   1854  had  been  a 
member  of  the  Academic  francaise.     A  confer- 

1  "  Des  Prophecies  en  vogue  " — the  first  article  was  printed 
in  the  Precis  for  October,  1870,  pp.  479  et  seq.,  and  it  was 
followed  by  four  others. 

26 


Mgr.  Dupanloup  27 

ence  delivered  by  him  on  this  subject  was  after- 
wards published  as  a  pastoral  under  the  title  of 
Lettre  sur  les  propheties  contemporaines.  In  this 
the  Bishop  tells  his  readers  incidentally  that  he 
had  had  more  than  twenty  books  of  this  kind  in 
his  hands,  and  that  he  knew  that  of  one  of  them, 
Le  Grand  Avenement  precede  du  Grand  Prodige, 
more  than  50,000  copies  had  been  sold  in  a  few 
weeks.  But  the  main  appeal  of  the  letter  is,  of 
course,  concerned  with  the  regrettable  effects 
produced  upon  the  Christian  life  by  the  unre- 
strained indulgence  of  this  appetite  for  the 
marvellous. 

From  all  sides  to-day  [wrote  the  Bishop]  we  hear 
of  nothing  but  miracles  and  prophecies,  and  to  our 
generation  also  one  may  say  what  our  Lord  used 
once  to  say  to  His  :  "  This  generation  seeketh  a 
sign  " — Generatio  ista  signum  queer-it.  There  is 
nothing  to  surprise  us  in  this  phenomenon.  Periods 
of  trouble,  like  ours,  are  its  ordinary  witnesses  and 
causes.  How  much,  indeed,  in  the  midst  of  our 
sorrows  have  we  not  need  of  that  token  for  good — 
signum  in  bonum  (Ps.  Ixxxv.  17) — of  which  the 
Psalmist  speaks?  When  great  political  and  social 
commotions  have  upset  men's  minds,  when  un- 
wonted calamities  have  tallen  upon  a  people,  when 
profound  revolutions  have  shaken  a  nation  to  its 
very  foundations,  disturbed  imaginations  begin  to 
work ;  they  try  to  pierce  the  darkness  of  events,  to 
catch  a  glimpse  of  the  mysterious  unknown  hidden  in 
the  future,  to  discover  at  last  the  salvation  long 
desired,  the  expected  Saviour.  Then  the  real,  where 


28  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

nothing  reassuring  is  seen,  is  surrendered  for  the 
imaginary,  where  everything  is  seen,  especially  what 
is  hoped  for.  Prophets  arise  and  wonder-workers 
too;  visions,  oracles,  prodigies  are  multiplied;  with 
fanatics  in  good  faith  knaves  get  mingled.  Never- 
theless, souls  in  their  craving  for  light  turn  eagerly 
to  any  source  which  offers  it,  a  curious  ear  is  lent 
to  those  marvellous  tales  and  to  those  voices1  which 
profess  to  have  come  from  on  high ;  the  credulous, 
and  sometimes  the  sceptical  themselves,  through 
that  deep  need  of  penetrating  the  unknown  which  is 
inborn  in  the  human  soul,  are  swept  off  their  feet ;  a 
whole  generation  feeds  on  chimeras,  and  at  one  time 
seized  with  vain  fears  trembles  before  the  calamities 
announced  as  at  the  approach  of  the  year  1000,  at 
another  following  the  dominant  craze  is  filled  with 
exultation,  or  goes  to  sleep  without  misgiving, 
buoyed  up  by  hopes  that  are  equally  baseless.3 

And  since  we  are  upon  this  topic,  it  may  be 
well  to  supplement  Mgr.  Dupanloup's  shrewd 
criticism  by  citing  the  text  of  certain  conciliar 
decrees  to  which  he  rightly  makes  appeal  as 
expressing  the  mind  of  the  Church  in  the  most 
authoritative  manner.  The  first  of  these  pro- 
nouncements was  drawn  up  in  the  form  of  a 
papal  bull  during  the  fifth  council  of  Lateran  in 
1516,  sacro  approbante  concilia,  and  includes  the 
following  passage  :  * 

1  An  obvious  reference  to  the  book  previously  spoken  of,  Voix 
Prophdtiques.  There  were  also  German  collections  bearing  the 
same  title  Prophetenstimmen. 

*  Dupanloup,   Lettre  sur  les  Prophtties,   Eng.   trans.,  p.  4. 
I  have  slightly  modified  the  rendering  there  given. 

*  Harduin,  Concilia,  vol.  ix,  cols.  1808-9. 


The  Fifth  Council  of  Lateran       29 

As  regards  the  time  at  which  the  calamities  to 
come  are  to  happen,  the  coming  of  Antichrist  and 
the  day  of  judgment,  let  no  one  allow  himself  to 
announce  them  and  to  fix  their  date,  for  Truth  has 
said  that  it  is  not  for  us  to  know  the  times  or 
moments  which  the  Father  keeps  in  His  own  power. 
All  who  up  to  the  present  have  dared  to  make  such 
predictions  have  been  found  to  be  liars  (ipsos 
mentitos  fuisse  constat),  and  it  is  certain  that  their 
conduct  has  done  no  small  injury  to  the  authority 
of  those  who  are  content  to  preach  without  predict- 
ing. For  the  future,  then,  we  forbid  all  and  any 
to  announce  future  events  in  their  public  discourses 
by  means  of  fanciful  explanations  of  Holy  Scripture, 
to  pose  as  having  received  such  instructions  from 
the  Holy  Ghost  or  by  a  revelation  from  Heaven,  and 
to  set  forth  strange  and  vain  divinations  or  things  of 
that  sort.  ...  If,  however,  the  Lord  reveal  to 
anyone  by  inspiration  certain  things  to  come  to  pass 
in  the  Church  of  God  ...  as  the  matter  is  of  great 
moment,  seeing  that  no  spirit  is  to  be  lightly 
believed,  but  spirits  are  to  be  proved,  as  the  Apostle 
testifies,  whether  they  are  of  God,  we  will  that,  in 
ordinary  law,  such  alleged  inspirations  (tales 
assertae  inspirationes),  be  understood  to  be  hence- 
forth reserved  to  the  examination  of  the  Apostolic 
See  before  being  made  public  or  preached  to  the 
people  (antequam  publicentur  aut  populo  prcedicen- 
tur).  And  if  any  dare  in  any  way  to  contravene  the 
premisses,  besides  the  penalties  provided  by  law 
against  such,  we  will  them  to  incur  a  sentence  of 
excommunication  also,  from  which  they  can  be 
absolved  only  by  the  Roman  Pontiff,  except  when 
at  the  point  of  death. 


30  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

Although  these  warnings  were  immediately 
addressed  to  the  popular  preachers,  who  at  a 
time  of  political  excitement  and  religious  decay 
scandalized  many  by  their  extravagances,1  they 
nevertheless  illustrate  the  attitude  of  ecclesiastical 
authority  towards  all  such  pretended  revelations 
in  general.  Moreover,  a  comparatively  modern 
decree,  passed  at  Paris  in  a  national  council  of 
all  the  French  Bishops  in  1849,  and  subsequently 
ratified  by  the  Holy  See,  is  still  more  to  our 
purpose.  Its  enactment  was  obviously  occasioned 
by  the  vogue  of  trie  prophecy  of  Orval  and  a 
number  of  similar  predictions  then  current  in 
France  : 

Since  [said  the  Council]  according  to  the  Apostle 
not  every  spirit  is  to  be  believed,  we  warn  our  flocks 
that  no  one  rash'y  set  himself  to  spread  the  know- 
ledge of  prophecies,  visions  and  miracles  relating  to 
politics,  the  future  state  of  the  Church  or  similar 
subjects,  if  published  without  their  having  been 
examined  and  approved  by  the  Ordinary.  Parish 
priests  and  confessors,  in  their  prudence,  will  deter 
the  faithful  of  Christ  from  a  too  easy  acceptance  of 

1  The  example  set  by  Savonarola  some  years  before  had  been 
followed  by  a  number  of  other  popular  preachers.  Jerome  of 
Bergamo  in  1508  had  announced  to  vast  crowds  that  Italy 
would  be  devastated,  and  that  Rome,  Venice,  and  Milan  would 
be  destroyed  by  a  nation  hitherto  unknown.  A  little  later  a 
Franciscan,  Francesco  da  Montepulciano,  produced  a  still  more 
tremendous  sensation  by  his  prophecies  of  woes  to  come.  He 
predicted  that  Rome  would  be  laid  waste,  the  clergy  of  evil 
life  exterminated,  that  for  three  years  there  would  be  neither 
mass  nor  sermons,  that  the  land  would  be  bathed  in  blood,  etc. 
See  the  account  given  by  Pastor,  History  of  the  Popes,  Eng. 
trans.,  vol.  v,  pp.  217  et  seq. 


Pope  Leo  XIII  3 1 

them.  They  will  also,  as  occasion  offers,  explain 
the  rules  prescribed  by  the  Church  on  this  subject, 
and  especially  will  they  admonish  the  faithful  that 
their  conduct  is  to  be  governed,  not  by  private 
revelations,  but  by  the  ordinary  laws  of  Christian 
wisdom.1 

Neither  must  it  be  supposed  that  because  the 
decrees  most  commonly  appealed  to  are  com- 
paratively remote  in  date  this  legislation  has 
fallen  into  desuetude.  There  is,  for  example,  a 
section  contained  in  the  Constitution  Officiorum 
et  munerum  of  Pope  Leo  XIII  (January  25th, 
1897),  which  runs  as  follows  : 

Books  and  writings  which  recount  new  appari- 
tions, revelations,  visions,  prophecies  and  miracles, 
or  which  introduce  new  devotions,  even  under  the 
plea  of  their  being  for  private  use,  supposing  such 
to  be  published  without  the  lawful  permission  of 
ecclesiastical  authority,  are  forbidden. 

Still  more  recent  is  an  ordinance  published  by 
Mgr.  Douais,  Bishop  of  Beauvais,  and  embodied 
in  a  pastoral  dated  May  25th,  1912.  It  is  interest- 
ing to  note  the  provisions  of  this  document, 
though,  of  course,  its  binding  force  is  limited  to 
the  diocese  for  which  it  was  issued  : 

i.  We  wish  the  most  scrupulous  reserve  to  be 
practised  in  the  forum  externum  in  regard  to  all 
stories  of  revelations,  prophecies  and  miracles. 

ii.  If  public  notice  be  directed  to  such  revelations, 
prophecies  and  miracles,  we  order  them  to  be  at 
once  submitted  to  ecclesiastical  authority. 

1  Ada  et  Decreta,  Collectio  Lacensis,  vol.  iv,  p.  17. 


32  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

iii.  We  forbid  them  to  be  communicated  publicly 
to  others,  or  to  be  propagated  before  they  have  been 
canonically  pronounced  upon  or  without  our 
authorization. 

iv.  We  forbid  preachers  either  of  the  regular  or 
secular  clergy  to  introduce  such  stories  into  their 
sermons  without  first  submitting  them  to  ecclesi- 
astical authority.  The  priests  in  charge  of  parishes 
are  bound  to  make  this  prohibition  known  to 
preachers  who  are  strangers. 

v.  Such  stories  must  not  be  published  either  as 
books,  or  as  articles  in  periodicals,  without  our 
permission,  and  we  forbid  the  reading  of  them. 

vi.  When  authorization  is  given  to  publish  such 
stories  the  injunction  of  Urban  VIII  should  be 
carefully  observed. 

vii.  We  ask  pious  persons,  and  our  dear 
daughters  the  nuns  of  all  religious  communities,  to 
be  particularly  on  their  guard  in  this  matter.  What- 
ever may  be  said  to  them,  and  whatever  the  degree 
of  trust  they  repose  in  those  who  converse  with 
them,  they  ought  to  be  extremely  reserved  and 
prudent.  The  truest  piety  is  that  which  is  exact  in 
observing  the  laws  of  the  Church. 

viii.  We  forbid  the  publication  of  all  devotions 
and  prayers  unless  they  have  been  duly  approved.1 

No  doubt  all  the  Bishops  did  not  in  this  matter 
hold  the  views  here  expressed  by  Mgr.  Douais, 
and  in  the  years  which  followed  the  Franco- 
Prussian  War  there  was  some  difference  of 
opinion  and  action  among  them  regarding  the 

1  See  the  Revue  du  Clergt  Fratifais,  Aug.  ist,  1912,  vol.  Ixii, 
P-  367- 


An  Archiepiscopal  Imprimatur      33 

ecclesiastical  approval  of  books  of  prophecies. 
Father  de  Buck  in  1870  was  thoroughly  justified 
in  saying  that  for  the  most  part  these  collections 
appeared  without  the  sanction  of  authority. 
Even  in  the  case  of  the  Voix  Prpphetiques, 
which  was  less  open  to  objection  than  some  other 
publications  of  the  same  class,  the  three  first 
editions  bore  no  episcopal  imprimatur  of  any 
kind.  The  fourth,  however,  had  two  or  three 
letters  prefixed  which  might  be  held  to  amount 
equivalently  to  an  ecclesiastical  approval.  The 
fifth,  published  towards  the  close  of  1872,  bears 
a  formal  though  somewhat  guarded  commenda- 
tion signed  by  Mgr.  Dechamps,  Archbishop  of 
Malines,  in  whose  diocese  the  book  was  printed. 
His  letter  seems  to  throw  the  responsibility  of 
approving  such  collections  upon  sundry  articles 
which  had  appeared  in  the  well-known 
Jesuit  periodical  of  Italy,  the  Civilta  Cattolica.1 
These  articles  directed  attention  to  the  predic- 
tions as  documents  which  deserved  to  be  treated 
seriously  and  which  might  usefully  help  to  in- 
spire confidence  in  the  hearts  of  despondent 
believers.  Probably  the  Archbishop  felt  that  it 
would  be  tactful  to  entrench  himself  against  such 
criticisms  as  those  of  Father  de  Buck  by  invoking 
the  example  of  the  Jesuit  Father's  own  religious 
brethren  who,  living  under  the  shadow  of  the 
Vatican,  were  believed  to  be  almost  more  papal 

1  See  in  particular  Civilta  Cattolica,  March  22nd,  1872, 
pp.  526  et  seq.,  and  April  23rd,  1872,  pp.  291  et  seq.  Cf. 
November  i7th,  1871,  p.  529,  and  July  2nd,  1854,  pp.  i  et  seq. 


34  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

than  the  Pope  himself.  It  must  be  confessed 
that  these  Civilta  articles  are  now  rather  pitiable 
reading.  The  trust  reposed  in  such  predictions 
as  those  of  Marie  Lataste,  Anna  Maria  Taigi, 
and  in  the  still  more  apocryphal  utterances 
attributed  to  St.  Caesarius  of  Aries,  Jerome 
Bottin,  and  David  Pare",1  teach  a  painful  lesson 
as  to  the  fallibility  of  the  guidance  afforded  by 
the  learned  editors.  It  becomes  plain  that  in 
matters  in  which  the  wish  was  the  father  to  the 
thought,  neither  all  their  orthodoxy  nor  all  their 
theological  learning  could  save  them  from  egre- 
gious self-deception. 

Speaking  generally,  however,  very  few  of  the 
books  of  prophecies,  especially  at  first,  appeared 
with  any  sort  of  imprimatur,  and  the  enthusiasts 
who,  with  more  or  less  of  good  faith,  were  keenly 
interested  in  propagating  these  revelations  of  the 
future,  realized  the  advantage  of  associating 
them  as  far  as  possible  with  names  which  all  the 
religious  world  held  in  veneration.  Sometimes 
this  result  was  attained  by  attributing  the  pro- 
phecies themselves  to  saintly  authors  like  St. 
Bridget,  St.  Caesarius,  the  Cure"  d'Ars,  the  Abb£ 
Eymard,  etc.,  sometimes  by  inducing  priests 
who  were  exceptionally  respected  to  take  an 
active  part  in  the  propagation  of  this  kind  of 
literature.  A  remarkable  example  of  the  latter 
procedure  may  be  noticed  in  the  case  of  the 

1  All  these  writers  were  quoted  in  justification  of  the  belief 
that  the  triumph  of  the  Church  might  be  expected  in  the  near 
future  during  the  pontificate  of  Pius  IX  himself. 


The  Saint  of  Toulouse  35 

well-known  Capuchin  missioner,  Father  Marie- 
Antoine  (Clergue),  whose  Life,  a  volume  of  680 
pages  royal  8vo,  has  recently  been  published 
under  the  title  of  Le  Saint  de  Toulouse.1  The 
good  Father's  biographer,  while  skating  as 
rapidly  as  possible  over  thin  ice,  does  not  dis- 
guise the  fact  that  the  holy  Capuchin  was  the 
compiler  of  one  of  the  most  famous  of  these  col- 
lections of  prophecies,  that  known  as  Le  grand 
Pape  et  le  grand  Roi.  He  evidently  feels  that 
some  sort  of  explanation  is  called  for,  and  thus 
in  speaking  of  the  nightmare  of  discouragement 
and  irreligion  which  had  settled  down  on  France 
after  the  war  of  1870,  the  biographer  just  re- 
ferred to  tells  us  that  all  good  Frenchmen  eagerly 
looked  forward  to  happier  times,  adding  that 

While  the  wiser  of  them  were  content  to  wait 
for  events  to  develop,  the  more  ardent  spirits,  eager 
to  anticipate  the  coming  of  the  dawn,  turned  their 
thoughts  heavenwards  and  consulted  the  future.  In 
response  to  this  state  of  popular  feeling,  which  was 
widespread  in  France  at  the  time,  an  immense 
number  of  predictions  were  dragged  to  light  out  of 
old  books,  or  legends  of  more  or  less  doubtful 
authenticity.  The  great  body  of  Catholics  believed 
in  them.  The  most  sober  newspapers,  the  Univers 
and  the  various  Semaines  Catholiques,  joined  in 
giving  them  currency,  priests  of  high  standing 
guaranteed  them  authentic.  These  prophecies 
gratified  a  craving  almost  universally  felt.  The 

1  Le  Saint  de  Toulouse,  Vie  du  Pere  Marie- Antoine, 
O.F.M.C.,  par  P.  Ernest-Marie  de  Beaulieu  (Toulouse,  1908). 


36  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

present  outlook  was  so  gloomy  that  men  were  driven 
to  find  consolation  in  hopes,  which,  alas  !  were  no 
more  than  phantoms,  and  which  only  led  to  further 
disappointment. l 

One  of  the  most  ardent  collectors  of  these  pro- 
phetic utterances  was,  it  appears,  a  certain 
Father  Fulgentius,  an  enthusiastic  royalist  and 
supporter  of  the  Bourbon  claims,  who  was  then 
also  a  member  of  the  Capuchin  community  at 
Toulouse.  From  him  were  derived  the  materials 
for  the  two  volumes  which  the  saintly  Pere  Marie- 
Antoine  published  under  the  titles  of  Le  grand 
Pape  et  le  grand  Roi  and  Le  prochain  Denoue- 
ment de  la  Crise  actuelle.  The  biographer  just 
quoted  tells  us  that  of  all  the  brochures  of  which 
Pere  Marie-Antoine  was  the  author  these  two 
had  the  greatest  sale.  Even  a  member  of  the 
French  episcopate,  Mgr.  Epivent,  Bishop  of 
Aire,  wrote  enthusiastically  to  the  author  when 
the  second  of  these  two  works  appeared  : 

I  have  drained  it  at  a  draught  as  one  drinks 
from  a  goblet  full  of  a  beverage  unknown,  but  most 
refreshing.  It  has  left  a  flavour  of  piety  behind, 
and  also  a  steadfast  spirit  to  encounter  the  terrors 
with  which  we  are  threatened 

Unhappily,  the  Great  Monarch,  Henri  V, 
whose  glorious  reign  these  prophecies  professed 
to  announce,  died  in  1883,  and  by  this  fact  it 
was  made  clear  that  "  the  saint  of  Toulouse,**  in 
spite  of  his  personal  holiness,  was  by  no  means 

1  Le  Saint  de  Toulouse,  p.  367. 


The  Curt  d'Ars  37 

divinely  inspired  when  he  encouraged  his 
countrymen  to  attach  credence  to  these  fallacious 
predictions. 

Naturally  the  holiness  of  the  author  of  a  pro- 
phecy was  held  to  be  a  point  of  even  more  im- 
portance than  the  holiness  of  those  who  put 
faith  in  it.  We  cannot,  therefore,  be  surprised 
to  find  that  the  authority  of  such  a  man  as  the 
Cure*  d'Ars  was  widely  invoked  to  lend  credit  to 
the  dream  of  a  renovated  France,  a  triumphant 
Christian  monarchy,  and  a  pope  reinstated  in  his 
temporal  jurisdiction.  This  particular  attempt 
to  invest  the  alluring  but  baseless  vision  with  a 
religious  sanction  has  the  better  claim  to  our 
attention  because  the  same  materials  were  served 
up  again  in  the  September  of  1914,  and  were 
supposed  to  find  their  true  fulfilment  in  the 
events  of  the  military  drama  then  being  enacted. 
The  whole  process  is  worth  studying  as  an  illus- 
tration of  the  mentality  of  those  who  put  faith  in 
revelations  of  this  kind. 

Although  the  accredited  biographers  of  the 
Blessed  Jean  Marie  Vianney  attribute  to  him  a 
remarkable  prophetic  gift,  often  exercised  for  the 
benefit  of  individual  souls  who  consulted  him, 
they  are  silent  as  to  any  disclosures  of  future 
political  events.  It  was  a  fixed  principle  with  the 
holy  Cure*  to  concern  himself  as  little  as  possible 
with  such  matters  of  public  interest.  The  sanc- 
tification  of  his  own  soul  and  the  help  of  his 
neighbours  absorbed  all  his  time.  The  fact  then 
D 


3  8  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

remains  that  all  these  alleged  predictions  of  the 
Cure"  d'Ars  which  were  so  keenly  discussed  in 
1871  and  in  1914  depend  simply  upon  the  testi- 
mony of  a  young  lay-brother  unnamed,  who,  as 
the  political  crisis  of  the  Franco-Prussian  War 
grew  more  and  more  grave,  professed  to  recall  in 
more  and  more  detail  what  had  been  told  him  by 
the  Cure  in  the  course  of  two  interviews  some 
twelve  or  fifteen  years  earlier.  If  we  had  to  de- 
pend entirely  upon  the  information  of  the  Abbe* 
Curicque,  the  compiler  of  the  Voix  Prophe- 
tiques,  we  should  not  even  know  to  what  reli- 
gious congregation  this  lay-brother  belonged  ; 
but  in  the  Grand  Pape  et  grand  Roi  of  Pere 
Marie-Antoine  we  learn  that  he  was  a  member 
of  the  Lazarist  Order.  That  the  recollections  of 
this  anonymous  brother,  unsupported  by  any 
other  evidence,  oral  or  documentary,  should 
have  been  so  readily  credited  and  should  have 
supplied  material  for  discussion  to  thousands  of 
Catholics  and  even  unbelievers,  is  alone  a 
curious  revelation  of  the  keenness  of  the  popular 
appetite  for  the  marvellous.  But  the  manner  in 
which  the  so-called  prophecy  was  revived  and 
re-cast  forty-three  years  later  to  fit  quite  another 
set  of  circumstances  is  even  more  instructive. 
Perhaps  the  simplest  way  of  making  the  matter 
intelligible  will  be  to  translate  the  relevant  data 
from  the  pages  of  the  Abbe*  Curicque  in  the 
order  in  which  they  were  taken  down  by  the 
members  of  the  lay-brother's  own  community. 


An  unsupported  Witness  39 

It  appears,  then,  that  on  September  7th,  1870 
(Sedan,  it  will  be  remembered,  was  fought  on 
September  2nd  of  that  year)  the  lay-brother  told 
his  confreres  something  of  the  predictions  which 
he  had  heard,  as  he  maintained,  from  the  lips  of 
the  venerated  Cure"  himself  shortly  before  his 
death  in  August,  1859.  We  may  note  as  an  in- 
structive fact,  that  at  first  the  community  ad- 
mittedly paid  no  heed  to  these  communications.1 
This  seems  to  show  that  they  did  not  usually 
regard  the  narrator  as  a  very  serious  or  trust- 
worthy person.  We  are  expressly  informed 
that  it  was  only  towards  the  end  of  the  siege 
of  Paris  that  they  could  be  persuaded  to  listen 
to  him  with  any  attention.  However,  when 
the  siege  was  already  over,  that  is  in  February, 
1871,  a  formal  statement  of  these  disclosures  was 
drawn  up,  which  the  lay-brother  afterwards 
signed.  Most  of  this  statement  relates  to  the 
brother's  vocation  to  the  Lazarists  and  to  the 
history  of  the  house  in  which  he  lived,  but  some 
other  rather  obscure  utterances  seem  to  refer  to 
the  siege  of  Paris  by  the  Prussians,  as  well  as 
to  the  capitulation  of  the  city,  the  surrender  of 
weapons,  and  to  the  difficulty  in  obtaining  pro- 
visions. Then  the  account  goes  on  : 

The  Brother  also  added  that  M.  Vianney  told 
him  :  ' '  It  will  not  last  long.  People  will  think  that 
all  is  lost,  but  the  Bon  Dieu  will  make  everything 

1  Voix  Prophetiques,  5th  ed.,  vol.  ii,  p.  177.  No  mention  of 
this  incredulity  occurs  in  the  3rd  ed. 


40  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

right.  It  will  be  a  sign  of  the  last  Judgment.  Paris 
will  be  transformed,  and  also  two  or  three  other 
cities.  They  will  want  to  canonize  me,  but  they 
will  not  have  time  for  it.*" 

From  Abbe*  Curicque's  account  it  plainly  ap- 
pears that  this  passage  was  already  an  addition 
to  the  brother's  original  statement.  But  at  the 
beginning  of  March,  1871,  he  had  still  further 
recollections  to  communicate.  The  Abbe" 
Curicque,  when  making  these  public  in  the 
autumn  of  1871,  remarks  that  this  further  sup- 
plement, like  that  just  quoted,  must  plainly  have 
reference  to  events  which  at  that  date  had  not 
yet  come  to  pass. 

The  enemy  will  not  quit  the  country  alto- 
gether.3 They  will  come  back  again,  and  they  will 
destroy  everything  on  their  line  of  march.  No 
resistance  will  be  offered;  they  will  be  allowed  to 
advance,  but  after  that  their  supplies  will  be  cut  off 
and  they  will  suffer  great  losses.  They  will  retire 
towards  their  own  country,  but  we  shall  follow  them 
up,  and  not  many  of  them  will  ever  reach  home. 

1  Voix  Prophttiques,  5th  ed.,  vol.  ii,  p.  182.  In  the  version 
printed  by  Pere  Marie-Antoine  other  details  are  added  in  this 
same  context.  Lyons  and  Marseilles  'are  named  as  other  cities 
that  would  be  transformed,  and  it  is  stated  that  "  God  shall 
come  to  help,  the  good  shall  triumph  when  the  return  of  the 
King  (Henri  V)  shall  be  announced.  This  shall  re-establish  a 
peace  and  prosperity  without  example.  Religion  shall  flourish 
again  better  than  ever  before."  See  The  Christian  Trumpet 
(London,  1875),  p.  88. 

3  It  is  important  to  remember  that  when  this  was  first  com- 
mitted to  writing  in  1871,  the  war  was  indeed  over,  but  many 
Prussian  garrisons  were  still  left  in  France  to  secure  the  obser- 
vance of  the  conditions  of  peace. 


How  the  Story  Grew  41 

Then  we  shall  recapture  everything  that  they  have 
carried  off,  and  plenty  more  besides.1 

According  to  Pere  Marie-Antoine's  version 
the  lay  brother  here  spoke  not  of  the  "  enemy  " 
but  of  the  "  Prussians."  He  also  declared  that 
the  Prussians  would  advance  as  far  as  Poitiers, 
300  miles  south-west  of  Paris,  and  that  the 
"  papal  zouaves  of  Cathelineau  and  Charette 
would  cover  themselves  with  glory." 

But  not  even  yet  were  the  brother's  recollec- 
tions entirely  exhausted.  In  November,  1871, 
too  late  for  this  third  edition  of  the  Voix 
Prophetiques,  Abbe"  Curicque  received  from  the 
Lazarists  these  further  details,  written  down 
some  time  in  August,  concerning  M.  Vianney's 
communication  to  the  lay  brother  fifteen  years 
before. 

The  crisis  is  not  over  yet  (la  grosse  affaire 
n'est  pas  passee).  Paris  will  be  demolished  and  burnt 
in  earnest,  but  not  entirely.  Events  will  happen 
more  terrible  than  anything  we  have  yet  seen  (he 
refers  presumably  to  the  siege  and  the  period  of  the 
Commune).  However,  there  will  be  a  limit  beyond 
which  the  destruction  will  not  go. 

Asked  what  kind  of  limit  was  meant,  the 
brother  declared  he  did  not  know  :  "  But,"  he 
added,  "  we  shall  come  through  all  right  (pour- 
tant  nous  serous  en  de$a),  and  I  should  not 
think  of  leaving  the  house."  By  this  time  the 
brother,  who  according  to  his  own  fellow  reli- 

1   Voix    Prophetiques,    3rd   ed.,    p.    349. 


42  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

gious,  was  a  simple  countryman  who  in  general 
knew  little  of  the  news  of  the  day,  had  heard  of 
the  indemnity  and  of  the  Prussian  garrisons  that 
were  to  remain  in  France  until  the  indemnity 
was  paid.  At  any  rate,  it  was  only  at  this  date 
(August,  1 871)'  that  he  represented  the  Cure 
d'Ars  as  having  finally  said  to  him  : 

"  They  will  want  them  to  leave  sooner,  but  the 
enemy  will  demand  more  money  or  some  other  con- 
cession, and  they  will  come  back.  This  time  it  will 
be  a  fight  to  a  finish  (on  se  battra  pour  tout  de  bon) ; 
for  on  the  first  occasion  our  soldiers  did  not  fight 
well,  but  then  they  will  fight ;  oh !  how  they  will 
fight !  The  enemy,  it  is  true,  will  let  Paris  burn, 
and  they  will  be  well  pleased  with  themselves,  but 
we  shall  smash  them  and  put  them  to  flight  for 
good  and  all  (et  on  les  chassera  pour  tout  de  bon). 
1  don't  know  (added  the  holy  Cur£)  why  I  tell  you 
all  this,  but  when  the  time  comes  you  will  remember 
it,  and  you  will  be  quite  easy  in  your  mind,  as  well  as 
those  who  shall  believe  you. ' >J 

To  anyone  who  pays  attention  to  the  sequence 
and  the  wording  of  these  communications,  it 
became  abundantly  plain  that  the  brother  be- 
lieved (what  so  many  other  Frenchmen  believed, 
while  Prussian  garrisons  still  remained  on 
French  soil  and  the  payments  of  the  war  indem- 
nity were  still  being  made),  that  the  five  milliards 
of  French  gold  once  delivered  over  would  only 

1  Voix  Prophttiques,  4th  ed.,  vol.  ii,  p.  172  ;  5th  ed.,  vol.  ii, 
p.  183. 
3  Ibid. 


The  Prophecy  adapted  to  1914     43 

whet  the  Prussian  appetite  for  more.  The  oppor- 
tunity would  soon  come  (ce  ne  sera  pas  long), 
a  pretext  would  be  found  for  fresh  demands,  the 
Prussians  would  again  invade  France,  Paris 
would  be  burned,  but  God  in  the  end  would  in- 
tervene and  the  enemy  would  have  to  disgorge 
all  they  had  taken. 

Now,  in  September,  1914,  those  who  endea- 
voured to  apply  this  prediction  to  the  campaign 
then  begun  cannot  fail  to  have  seen  the  weak 
points  of  such  an  interpretation.  But  they  took 
certain  sentences  apart  from  their  context,1  and 
some  of  the  more  unscrupulous  deliberately 
added  a  clause  to  the  original,  naming  a  feast 
of  Our  Lady  (the  Nativity  of  the  Blessed  Virgin, 
September  8th)  as  the  turning  point  of  the  cam- 
paign. Of  this  clause  concerning  the  feast  of 
Our  Lady  there  is  not  a  trace  either  in  the  ver- 
sion of  the  Abbe*  Curicque  or  even  in  what  he 
describes  as  the  interpolated  text  of  Pere  Marie- 
Antoine.  Still,  in  the  following  adaptation, 
which  was  widely  circulated  in  September,  1914, 
the  prophecy  sounded  highly  impressive  : 

The  enemy  will  not  retire  immediately.  They 
will  again  return,  destroying  as  they  come.  Effective 
resistance  will  not  be  offered  them.  They  will  be 
allowed  to  advance,  but  after  that  their  communica- 
tions will  be  cut  off,  and  they  will  suffer  great  losses. 
They  will  then  retire  towards  their  own  country,  but 
they  will  be  followed,  and  not  many  will  reach  their 

1  See  for  example  the  brochure  Les  Predictions  sur  la  Fin  de 
L'Allemagne  (Paris,  1914),  p.  20. 


44  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

goal.  They  will  then  restore  what  they  have  taken 
away,  and  more  in  addition.  Much  more  terrible 
things  will  happen  than  have  yet  been  seen.  Paris 
will  suffer,  but  a  great  triumph  will  be  witnessed  on 
the  Feast  of  Our  Lady.1 

To  those  who  still  continue  to  treat  this  predic- 
tion seriously  one  can  only  point  out  that,  accord- 
ing to  the  express  terms  of  the  lay  brother's 
account,  Paris  was  to  be  burned  down  before 
the  hour  of  triumph  came.  Paris  has  not  been 
burned  down,  and  it  is  consequently  quite  im- 
possible to  identify  the  change  of  fortune  which 
began  about  the  8th  of  September,  1914,  with 
the  final  victory  foreshadowed  by  the  Lazarist 
lay-brother.  It  is  difficult  to  resist  the  convic- 
tion that  the  brother,  no  doubt  in  all  good 
faith,  had  come  to  read  his  own  dreams  into  a 
somewhat  vague  recollection  of  his  conversa- 
tions with  the  holy  Cure.  At  any  rate,  as  the 
prophecy  stood  in  1872,  and  as  it  was  unani- 
mously interpreted  by  its  editors  at  that  date,  it 
is  certain  that  the  prediction  was  not  fulfilled. 

Not  unlike  the  forecast  attributed  to  the 
Blessed  Jean  Marie  Vianney  is  that  fathered 
upon  the  saintly  Dom  Bosco,  the  founder  of  the 
Salesians.  The  motive,  viz.,  to  secure  the 
appearance  of  high  religious  sanction  for  an 
encouraging  prognostic,  was  no  doubt  the  same 
in  each  case ;  but  while  the  prophecy  assigned  to 

1  See,  e.g.,  the  Daily  Chronicle  and  several  other  English 
newspapers. 


The  Dom  Bosco  Fabrication        45 

the  Cure"  d'Ars  has  at  least  some  shadow  of 
foundation  in  the  recollections  of  the  Lazarist 
lay-brother,  the  prediction  circulated  under  the 
name  of  Dom  Bosco  seems  to  have  been  a 
deliberate  imposture.  In  fact,  the  whole  setting 
of  the  document  proclaims  its  suspicious  charac- 
ter. It  appeared  in  many  English  and  foreign 
newspapers,  but  I  quote  it  here  exactly  as  it 
stands  in  the  Occult  Review  for  October,  1914 : 

As  I  go  to  press  yet  another  prediction  of  the  pre- 
sent war  reaches  me,  this  time  from  Norway,  though 
the  author  of  the  prediction  is  stated  to  have  been  a 
Portuguese  priest  by  the  name  of  Dom  Bosco,  who 
died  ten  years  ago,  and  the  quotation  is  a  translation 
from  the  well-known  French  paper,  Le  Matin,  in 
which  it  appeared  in  June,  1901.  It  runs  as  follows  : 

"  In  1913  or  1914  a  great  European  War  will 
break  out.  Germany  will  be  torn  completely  to 
pieces,  but  not  before  the  Germans  have  penetrated 
into  the  heart  of  France,  whence  they  will  be  forced 
back  to  the  further  banks  of  the  Rhine.  An  arrogant 
man  will  see  his  family  tree  cut  in  splinters  and 
trampled  upon  by  all  the  world.  Great  battles  will 
take  place  on  August  i5th  and  September  i5th.  At 
that  time  the  Pope  will  die  and  live  again,  and 
become  stronger  than  ever.  Poland  will  get  back 
her  rights." 

Now  to  begin  with,  Dom  Bosco  was  not  a 
Portuguese  priest,  neither  did  he  die  ten  years 
ago.  A  Piedmontese1  by  birth,  he  died  in  Turin 

1  It  is  possible  that  in  some  manuscript  copy  "  Piedmontese  " 
was  written,  but  misread  "  Portuguese."  On  the  other  hand, 
Father  Macey  tells  me  that  he  has  heard  of  another  Dom  Bosco 
who  was  of  Portuguese  nationality. 


46  Ecclesiastical  Authority 

in  January,  1888.  The  only  point  which  would 
lead  one  to  think  the  prophecy  worthy  of  a  mo- 
ment's consideration  is  the  explicit  statement 
that  this  prediction  containing  an  announce- 
ment of  the  Pope's  death  in  August  or  Septem- 
ber at  the  beginning  of  a  great  European  war 
was  published  in  Le  Matin  in  1901.  A  friend  of 
mine  who  had  the  curiosity  to  write  to  the  Paris 
office  of  Le  Matin  to  make  inquiries,  sent  on 
to  me  the  letter  he  received  in  answer.  The 
letter  simply  stated  that  Le  Matin  had  published 
no  such  prophecy.  This  may  be  taken  as  con- 
clusive, and  it  seems  useless  to  attempt  to  pursue 
the  matter  further.  The  more  so  that,  in  answer 
to  my  inquiries,  the  Very  Rev.  C.  B.  Macey,  the 
Rector  of  the  Salesian  School  at  Battersea,  has 
kindly  informed  me  that  according  to  the  unani- 
mous testimony  of  their  older  Fathers  there  was 
no  ground  for  attributing  such  a  prediction  to 
their  venerable  founder. 


I 


CHAPTER  III 

r  BROTHER  JOHANNES  " 

&  •  ^  HE  predictions  discussed  in  the 
*  last  chapter  have  already  brought 
us  into  contact  with  the  European 
war  of  1914,  and  we  may  now  ap- 
propriately occupy  ourselves  with 
the  most  audacious  of  the  many  attempts  to  exploit 
popular  credulity  which  have  been  occasioned  by 
that  great  political  crisis.  The  "  Prophecy  of 
Brother  Johannes,"  originally  published  in  the 
Figaro,1  has  attracted  an  enormous  amount  of 
attention,  and  has  been  translated  into  almost  all 
European  languages.  It  has  reached  even  the 
English  local  newspapers,  and  has  been  sold 
separately  in  many  forms.  But  despite  all  this 
publicity  and  the  strenuous  efforts  of  devout  be- 
lievers, it  remains  as  completely  destitute  of 
external  confirmation  as  when  it  was  first  made 
known.  There  are  sundry  people  who  declare 
vaguely  that  they  have  seen  it  in  print  years 
ago ;  but  no  definite  book  has  been  produced 
which  contains  it,  nor  has  even  the  title  been 

1  September  loth,  1914,  and  September  lyth,  1914.     Cf.  also 
the  issue  for  September  26th. 

47 


48  "Brother  Johannes " 

quoted  of  any  such  work.  So  far  as  the  public 
at  large  are  concerned,  the  prophecy  of  "  Brother 
Johannes  "  may  be  said  to  have  dropped  from 
the  clouds.  No  single  detail  in  the  account  given 
of  it  has  been  verified  or  seems  capable  of  veri- 
fication. But  let  us  turn  at  once  to  the  document 
itself,  which,  according  to  M.  Josephin  Pe"ladan, 
who  found  it  and  edited  it  for  the  Figaro,  is 
translated  from  a  Latin  original  written  some- 
where about  the  year  1600. 

THE  ANTICHRIST 

1.  People  will  many  times  have  imagined  that  they 
recognized  him,  for  all  the  slayers  of  the  Lamb  are 
alike  and   all   evil-doers  are  the  precursors  of  the 
supreme  evil-doer. 

2.  The  true  Antichrist  will  be  one  of  the  monarchs 
of  his  time,  a  son  of  Luther.     He  will  call  upon  the 
name  of  God  and  will  give  himself  out  to  be  His 
messenger. 

3.  This  prince  of  liars  will  swear  by  the  Bible.     He 
will  pose  as  the  arm  of  the  Almighty,  chastising  a 
corrupt  age. 

4.  He  will  be  a  one-armed  man,  but  his  soldiers 
without  number,   whose  motto  will  be  "  God  with 
us,"  will  resemble  the  legions  of  hell. 

5.  For  a  long  space  he  will  work  by  cunning  and 
crime,  and  his  spies  will  infest  the  whole  earth,  and 
he  will  make  himself  master  of  the  secrets  of  the 
mighty. 

6.  He  will  have  theologians  in  his  pay  who  will 
certify  and  demonstrate  that  his  mission  is  from  on 
high. 


The  Antichrist  of  To-day          49 

7.  A  war  will  furnish  him  with  the  opportunity  for 
throwing  off  the  mask.     It  will  not  be  the  war  that 
he  will  wage  against  a  French  sovereign,  but  another 
which  will  be  easily  recognized  by  this  mark,  that 
within  a  fortnight  all  the  world  will  be  involved  in  it. 

8.  It  will  set  all  Christian  peoples  by  the  ears,  as 
well  as  all  the  Mohammedans  and  other  nations  far 
remote.     In  all  the  four  quarters  of  the  world  armies 
will  muster. 

9.  For  the  angels  will  open  men's  minds,  and  in 
the  third  week  they  will  come  to  see  that  it  is  Anti- 
christ, and  that  they  will  all  be  made  slaves  if  they  do 
not  overthrow  this  hell-begotten  tyrant. 

10.  Antichrist  will  be  known  by  many  signs.     He 
will   above   all   put   to   the   sword   priests,    monks, 
women,  children,  and  old  men.     He  will  show  no 
pity.     He  will  sweep  onward,  a  blazing  torch  in  his 
hand,  like  the  barbarians  of  old,  but  the  name  of 
Christ  will  be  on  his  lips. 

11.  His  deceitful  words  will  be  like  those  of  the 
Christians,  but  his  acts  will  resemble  those  of  Nero 
and  the  Roman  persecutors.     There  will  be  an  eagle 
in  his  coat  of  arms,  as  there  is  also  in  that  of  his 
lieutenant,  the  other  wicked  emperor. 

12.  But  this  latter  is  a  Christian,  and  he  will  die 
of  the  curse  of  Pope  Benedict  who  will  be  elected  at 
the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Antichrist. 

13.  Priests  and  monks  will  no  longer  be  seen  to 
hear  confessions   and   to   absolve   the  combatants; 
partly  because  for  the  first  time  priests  and  monks  will 
fight  like  their  fellow-citizens,  partly  because  Pope 
Benedict  having  cursed  Antichrist,   it  will  be  pro- 
claimed that  those  who  fight  against  him  are  in  a 


50  "Brother  Johannes" 

state  of  grace,  and  if  they  die  go  straight  to  heaven 
as  the  martyrs  do. 

14.  The  Bull  that  proclaims  these  things  will  pro- 
duce   a    great    sensation ;    it    will    re-enkindle    the 
courage  of  the  faint-hearted,   and  it  will  cause  the 
death  of  the  monarch  allied  with  Antichrist. 

15.  Before  Antichrist  is  overthrown  more  men  will 
have  to  be  killed  than  were  ever  contained  within  the 
walls  of  Rome.     All  kingdoms  will  have  to  unite  in 
the  task,  for  the  cock,  the  leopard,  and  the  white 
eagle  would  never  get  the  better  of  the  black  eagle 
if  the  prayers  and  vows  of  all  mankind  did  not  come 
to  their  support. 

1 6.  Never  will  mankind  have  had  to  face  such  a 
danger,  because  the  triumph  of  Antichrist  would  be 
that  of  the  spirit  of  evil  who  has  taken  flesh  in  him. 

17.  For  it  has  been  said  that  twenty  centuries  after 
the  Incarnation  of  the  Word,  the  Beast  in  his  turn 
will  become  incarnate,  and  will  threaten  the  earth 
with  as  many  horrors  as  the  Divine  Incarnation  has 
brought  blessings. 

Here  the  first  instalment  of  the  prophecy 
stopped,  and  a  paragraph  was  added  to  explain 
with  quite  unnecessary  insistence,  that  the  pre- 
diction could  not  have  been  meant  to  apply  to 
the  war  1870-1,  but  that  its  many  indications 
were  only  verified  in  the  later  war.  After  which 
the  reader  was  told  : 

There  are  people  who  reject  all  prophecies.  But 
who  can  fail  to  be  moved  by  the  agreement  in  so 
many  precise  details  and  at  three  hundred  years' 
interval  between  the  predictions  of  Brother  Johannes 
and  the  events  going  on  around  us? 


The  Battle  of  the  Beasts  5 1 

The  prophecy  of  Brother  Johannes  does  not  end 
here,  it  contains  a  terrible  second  part ;  but  this  last 
promises  an  era  of  peace  and  of  light  for  France 
and  all  the  world,  and  before  this  era  is  reached  a 
vengeance  so  frightful  that  it  even  goes  beyond 
men's  thoughts  or  desires. 

This  article  attracted  an  amount  of  attention 
which  must  have  been  highly  gratifying  both  to 
the  contributor  himself  and  to  the  editor  of  the 
Figaro.  Accordingly  a  week  later  another  in- 
stalment was  launched,  consisting,  like  its  pre- 
decessor, of  exactly  seventeen  paragraphs  and 
with  a  curious  completeness  and  unity  of  its 
own,  as  if  the  prophet  three  centuries  before  had 
foreseen  that  his  vaticinations  were  going  to  be 
published  in  the  form  of  short  newspaper  articles. 
We  may  call  this  second  part,  though  this  is 
not  the  title  given  it  by  M.  P&adan,  by  the  name 
of— 

THE  BATTLE  OF  THE  BEASTS 

1 8.  Somewhere  about  the  year  2000  Antichrist  will 
stand   revealed ;   his  armies  will  exceed  in  number 
anything    that    can    be    imagined.      There   will    be 
Christians  amongst  his  hordes,   and   there   will  be 
Mohammedan     and     pagan     soldiers     among     the 
defenders  of  the  Lamb. 

19.  For  the  first  time  the  Lamb  will  be  entirely 
red,  in  the  whole  of  the  Christian  world  there  will  not 
be  a  single  spot  that  will  not  be  red  ;  and  the  heavens, 
the  earth,  the  water,  and  even  the  air  will  be  red, 
for  blood  will  flow  in  the  sphere  of  the  four  elements 
at  the  same  time. 


52  "Brother  Johannes" 

20.  The  black  eagle  will  throw   itself   upon  the 
cock,  which  will  lose  many  of  its  feathers,  but  will 
strike  heroically  with  its  spur.     It  would   soon  be 
exhausted  were  it  not  for  the  help  of  the  leopard 
and  its  claws. 

21.  The  black  eagle,  which  will  come  from  the 
land  of  Luther,  will  surprise  the  cock  from  another 
side,  and  will  invade  one-half  of  the  land  of  the  cock. 

22.  The  white  eagle,   which  will  come  from  the 
north,  will  set  upon  the  black  eagle  and  the  other 
eagle,  and  will  invade  the  land  of  the  Antichrist  from 
one  end  to  the  other. 

23.  The  black  eagle  will  find  itself  compelled  to  let 
the  cock  go  in  order  to  fight  the  white  eagle,  and  the 
cock  will  pursue  the  black  eagle  into  the  land  of 
Antichrist  to  help  the  white  eagle. 

24.  The  battles  waged  until  then  will  be  trifling  in 
comparison  to  those  that  will  take  place  in  the  land  of 
Luther,  because  the  seven  angels  will  at  the  same 
time  pour  fire  from  their  censers  on  the  impious  land 
(image  taken  from  the  Apocalypse),   which  means 
that  the  Lamb  will  order  the  extermination  of  the 
race  of  Antichrist. 

25.  When  the  Beast  sees  that  he  is  lost  he  will 
become  furious.     It  is  ordained  that  for  months  to- 
gether the  beak  of  the  white  eagle,  the  claws  of  the 
leopard,   and  the  spurs  of  the  cock  must  tear  his 
vitals. 

26.  Rivers   will  be  forded   over  masses   of   dead 
bodies,  which  in  some  places  will  change  the  course 
of  the  waters.     Only  great  noblemen,  generals,  and 
princes  will  receive  burial,  for  to  the  carnage  caused 
by  firearms  will  be  added  the  heaps  and  heaps  of 
those  who  perish  by  famine  and  plague. 


The  Punishment  of  Antichrist      53 

27.  Antichrist  will  ask  for  peace  again  and  again, 
but  the  seven  angels  who  precede  the  three  animals, 
defenders  of  the  Lamb,  have  declared  that  victory 
shall  only  be  accorded  upon  condition  that  Antichrist 
be  crushed,  like  straw  on  a  threshing-floor. 

28.  Executors   of   the  justice   of   the   Lamb,    the 
three  animals  cannot  stop  fighting  as  long  as  Anti- 
christ has  a  soldier  left  to  defend  him. 

29.  The  reason  why  the  sentence  of  the  Lamb  is  so 
ruthless    is    that    Antichrist    has    claimed    to    be    a 
Christian  and  to  be  acting  in  His  Name,  so  that  if  he 
did  not  perish  the  fruit  of  the  redemption  would  be 
lost,  and  the  gates  of  Hell  would  prevail  against  the 
Saviour. 

30.  It  will  be  seen  that  this  combat,  which  will 
be   fought   out   where   Antichrist   forges   his   arms, 
is  no  human  contest.     The  three  animals,  defenders 
of    the    Lamb,    will    exterminate    Antichrist's    last 
army ;  but  the  battlefield  will  become  as  a  funeral 
pyre,    larger  than   the   greatest   of   cities,    and   the 
corpses  will  have  changed  the  very  features  of  the 
landscape  through  the  ridges  of  mounds  with  which 
it  will  be  covered. 

31.  Antichrist   will  lose   his  crown,  and  will  die 
abandoned  and  insane.     His  Empire  will  be  divided 
up  into  twenty-two  States,  but  none  will  have  either 
a  stronghold,  an  army  or  ships  of  war. 

32.  The    white   eagle,    by    Michael's    order,    will 
drive  the   Crescent   from   Europe,    where   none   but 
Christians    will    remain ;    he    will    instal   himself    in 
Constantinople. 

33.  Then  an  era  of  peace  and  prosperity  will  begin 
for  all  the  universe,  and  there  will  be  no  more  war, 
E 


54  "Brother  Johannes'1 

each  nation  being  governed  according  to  its  wish  and 
living  in  justice. 

34.  There  will  be  no  more  Lutherans  or 
Schismatics.  The  Lamb  will  reign,  and  the  bliss  of 
human  race  will  begin.  Happy  they  who  escaping 
from  the  perils  of  this  prodigious  time  can  taste  of  its 
fruit,  which  will  be  the  reign  of  the  Holy  Spirit  and 
the  sanctification  of  humanity,  only  to  be  accom- 
plished after  the  defeat  of  Antichrist. 

It  can  be  hardly  necessary  to  point  out  that  by 
the  Cock  France  is  indicated,  by  the  Leopard 
England,  by  the  White  Eagle  Russia,  and  by 
the  Black  Eagle  and  the  other  Eagle  Germany 
and  Austria. 

On  reading  this  document  it  seems  almost 
incredible  that  it  can  ever  have  been  considered 
in  any  other  light  than  that  of  a  hoax  or  a 
mauvaise  plaisanterie.  But  many  persons  regard 
it  seriously,  and  among  them  not  only  simple- 
hearted  nuns  and  pious  women  who  would  con- 
sider a  forgery  in  these  matters  as  little  better 
than  a  sacrilege,  but  also  enthusiasts  of  a  much 
more  robust  mentality.  Its  fictitious  character, 
to  my  thinking,  cannot  for  a  moment  be  in 
doubt,  though  it  is  possible  that  in  the  first 
instance  it  may  have  been  fabricated  to  deride 
rather  than  to  mislead. 

To  begin  with,  it  lacks  any  sort  of  reliable 
authentication.  We  have  nothing  more  than 
M.  Peladan's  assurance  that  he  found  it  among 
his  father's  papers  after  the  death  of  the  latter, 


The  Provenance  of  the  Document  55 

which  took  place  in  1890.  It  is  further  stated 
that  the  prophecy  was  given  to  M.  Adrien 
Peladan,  pere,  by  a  Premonstratensian  monk  of 
S.  Michel  de  Trigolet,  near  Tarascon  (ominous 
name),  who  in  his  turn  had  received  it  from  an 
Abbe"  Donat,  a  learned  priest,  who  died  at  an 
advanced  age  at  Beaucaire.  For  all  this,  how- 
ever, we  have  no  evidence  except  the  declaration 
of  M.  Josephin  Peladan,  who  in  all  probability 
makes  no  scruple  of  availing  himself  of  a 
novelist's  privilege  to  invent  a  pedigree  for  his 
fictions.  Romance  writers  from  Sir  Walter  Scott 
downwards  have  always  been  fertile  in  such  ex- 
pedients. As  for  the  supposed  author,  Brother 
Johannes,  no  information  is  furnished  regarding 
hislrianner  of  life  or  the  place  in  which  he  lived, 
or  the  Order  to  which  he  belonged,  or  the 
circumstances  under  which  this  revelation  was 
made  to  him.  In  glancing  through  some  thirty 
odd  volumes  of  this  kind  of  literature  which  I 
have  been  able  to  consult,  I  have  not  come  upon 
the  least  trace  of  Brother  Johannes'  wonderful 
seventeenth  century  prophecy.  Neither  can  I 
recall  more  than  one  or  two  that  even  affect  the 
same  precision  of  detail.  Let  us  note  how  mar- 
vellously minute  the  information  is.  Antichrist 
is  to  be  an  Emperor  who  makes  a  parade  of  his 
devotion  to  the  Bible,  who  has  theologians  in 
his  pay  to  draw  up  manifestos,  and  who  is 
leagued  with  another  Emperor  near  to  death. 
Further,  he  has  only  the  use  of  one  arm,  he  is  a 


56  "Brother  Johannes" 

hypocrite,  and  he  has  vast  armies  under  his 
control,  whose  motto  is  "  God  with  us."  During 
his  time  a  Pope  shall  be  elected  called  Benedict. 
In  the  universal  war  that  breaks  out  and  em- 
braces both  East  and  West,  no  mercy  shall  be 
shown  to  priests  and  nuns,  and  numbers  of 
priests,  for  the  first  time  in  history,  shall  take 
part  as  combatants  (v.  13).  Even  Mohammedans 
and  pagans  shall  be  found  in  the  ranks  of  those 
opposing  Antichrist  (v.  18).  The  war  also  will 
be  fought  in  the  air  as  well  as  on  land  and  sea 
(v.  19).  Can  it  be  conceived  that  to  this  abso- 
lutely unknown  monk  of  the  seventeenth  century 
the  Almighty  should  have  given  such  marvellous 
prophetic  insight  as  is  not  to  be  paralleled  in  all 
the  recorded  history  of  the  canonized  saints  ?  I 
would  confidently  challenge  the  production  of 
one  well  attested  example,  either  of  saint,  mystic, 
or  seer  which  in  any  way  rivals  the  foreknow- 
ledge displayed  by  Brother  Johannes.  We  know 
what  the  scriptural  prophecies  are  like,  and  we 
may  easily  acquaint  ourselves  with  the  language 
of  the  authentic  prophetical  writings  of  saints 
like  St.  Hildegard,  St.  Bridget,  or  St.  Catherine 
of  Siena.  In  this  matter  one  of  the  very  col- 
lections against  which  we  are  protesting  lays 
down  quite  soberly  the  following  canon  as  a 
means  of  distinguishing  genuine  prophecies 
from  the  spurious  : 

Genuine  prophecies  have  a  prophetic  form.     They 
are  set  forth  in  marvellous  images  in  dark  mysterious 


The  Personality  of  Sar  Peladan     57 

words;  they  often  bring  together  totally  dissimilar 
events,  invert  occasionally  the  order  of  time;  while 
their  authors,  overpowered  with  the  general  impres- 
sion of  their  visions  employ  exaggerated  language. 
For  instance  "  the  blood  will  mount  even  to  the 
horses'  bridles."  From  these  peculiarities  we  see 
that  a  certain  obscurity  attaches  to  prophecies.  But 
this  very  quality  bespeaks  their  divine  origin,  as 
hereby  they  seem  to  bear  a  certain  conformity  to  the 
other  works  of  God.  In  nature  and  history  also 
God  conceals  Himself  in  order  that  those  only  who 
seek  Him  in  faith  may  find  Him.1 

Moreover,  the  gravest  suspicion  is  thrown 
upon  the  document  under  discussion,  owing  to 
the  fact  that  at  its  first  appearance  in  print, 
which  occurred,  as  already  stated,  in  the  Figaro 
of  September  loth  and  i7th,  1914,  it  was  intro- 
duced to  the  world  by  that  extraordinary  genius, 
M.  Josephin  Peladan,  whose  talent  is  undeniable, 
but  who  may  be  described  as  a  medley  of 
Richard  Wagner,  Cagliostro,  and  Madame 
Blavatsky  rolled  into  one.  Here  is  the  account 
of  him  in  Curinier's  Dictionnaire  national  des 
Contemporains.3 

PELADAN,  JOSEPHIN  called  "  le  Sar  "  (i.e.,  the 
Seer),  novelist,  art-critic  and  dramatic  author,  born 
at  Lyons  20  October,  1859.  The  son  of  a  religious 
writer,3  he  has  devoted  himself  to  a  style  of  litera- 

1  Beykirch,  Pvophetenstimmen  mit  Erklarungen,  Paderborn, 
1849,  p.  7. 

3  Vol.  v,  p.  15,  1905. 

8  M.  Adrien  Peladan,  p&re,  was  for  many  years  editor  of  the 
Semaine  religieuse  of  Lyons.  There  was  also  an  Adrien 
Peladan,  fils,  the  brother  of  Josephin. 


58  "Brother  Johannes" 

ture  which  is  partly  mystic  and  partly  erotic,  while 
the  titles  he  has  bestowed  upon  himself  of  Mage  and 
Seer  serve  to  direct  attention  to  his  own  personality, 
just  as  his  wish  to  seem  different  from  the  rest  of  the 
world  is  made  clear  to  all  by  his  eccentricities  of 
manner  and  costume.1 

In  the  same  notice,  after  a  long  list  of  his 
novels,  plays,  and  other  works,  we  are  told  that 
"  M.  Peladan  founded  the  Order  of  the  Rosy 
Cross,  Cross  of  the  Temple,  of  which  he 
appointed  himself  Grand-Master."  No  doubt 
the  Seer  identifies  himself  with  the  cause  of 
Catholicity,  or  at  any  rate  Christianity,  but  his 
creed  seems  to  be  one  peculiar  to  himself  in 
which  Occultism  plays  a  larger  part  than  reve- 
lation.2 On  the  other  hand,  it  is  quite  true  that 
M.  Peladan 's  father  was,  as  stated,  a  collector  of 
prophecies,  particularly  in  the  Catholic  and 
Legitimist  interest,  and  that  he  published  in 
1871  a  book  entitled  Le  nouveau  "  Liber  mira- 
bilis,"  ou  toutes  les  propheties  authentiques  sur 
les  temps  presents,  with  some  other  collections  of 
the  same  kind. 

1  M.  Peladan,  it  appears,  loves  to  attire  himself  in  long  robes 
or  oriental  fashion  and  texture,  while  his  portraits  are  evidently 
designed  to  produce  the  effect  of  a  Blavatsky-like  intensity  of 
expression.  All  the  resources  of  photography  have  been  invoked 
to  emphasize  the  dilated  pupils,  which  seem  to  read  into  the 
soul  and  penetrate  the  future. 

3  Here  is  a  specimen  of  one  of  his  utterances,  which,  for  fear 
of  misinterpretation,  I  copy  untranslated :  "  L'occulte  est 
1'esprit  m6me  de  la  religion  et  la  religion  est  le  corps  mime  de 
1'occulte.  L'occulte  est  la  tete  ou  se  congoit  le  mystere,  la 
religion  est  le  cceur  ou  le  mystere  se  dynamise."  Peladan, 
L'Occulte  Catholique. 


An  Accommodating  Editor         59 

Taken  as  a  whole,  the  explanations  which  M. 
Peladan  has  offered  concerning  the  prophecy  of 
Brother  Johannes  have  only  served  to  throw 
more  suspicion  upon  the  document  itself.  When 
it  first  appeared  in  the  Figaro  he  let  it  be 
understood  that  he  himself  had  translated  it 
from  the  Latin  (j'ai  trouve  a  la  traduire  et  a 
I'eclaircir).  Later  he  declared  that  he  had  done 
no  more  than  to  eliminate  a  few  verbal  redun- 
dancies (je  n'ai  fait  que  serrer  un  peu  I'expres- 
sion).1  Certain  it  is,  in  any  case,  that  not  a 
phrase  now  survives  which  suggests  a  Latin 
original.  On  the  other  hand,  M.  Peladan  tells 
us  that  out  of  consideration  for  republican  sus- 
ceptibilities he  omitted  sundry  references  to  "  the 
great  monarch,  the  offspring  of  the  lilies  "  to 
whom  in  the  text  the  final  defeat  of  Antichrist 
is  attributed,  also  that  he  "  bitterly  regretted 
not  having  struck  out  all  mention  of  the  present 
Pope,  the  religio  depopulata  of  St.  Malachy." 
But  it  is  just  by  this  free-and-easy  attitude 
towards  an  historical  document  that  the  editor 
forfeits  all  our  confidence.  Either  the  name  of 
Pope  Benedict  was  in  the  copy  left  by  M. 
Peladan,  pere,  or  it  was  not.  If  it  was  not,  his 
son,  by  inserting  it  in  the  text  without  warning 
of  any  kind,  has  committed  a  literary  fraud 
which  is  absolutely  unpardonable.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  the  name  of  the  present  pontiff  stood 

1  See  the  Figaro,  September  26th,  1914,  and  the  prophecy  in 
leaflet  form  published  at  the  "  Librairie  Moderne,"  5,  Rue  du 
Pont-de-Lodi,  Paris. 


60  "Brother  Johannes " 

revealed  in  a  document  copied  by  M.  Peladan, 
pere,  before  his  death  in  1890,  the  fact  is  mar- 
vellous beyond  example,  and  to  suppress  such 
a  circumstance  in  editing  the  document  would 
be  to  deprive  the  prophecy  of  its  supreme 
authentication.  As  the  whole  of  M.  Peladan 's 
commentary  shows,  his  mind  is  fixed,  not  upon 
what  is  true,  but  upon  what  is  expedient,  i.e., 
what  will  best  help  to  enkindle  the  fury  of  his 
countrymen  against  the  German  invader.  This 
attitude  alone  would  let  us  clearly  see  what  we 
have  to  expect  from  him. 

Again,  M.  Peladan  informs  his  readers  that 
what  he  has  published  "  is  only  a  section  (une 
tranche)  of  a  long  prophecy  which  extends  with 
occasional  breaks  from  the  sixteenth  to  the  twen- 
tieth century."  Surely,  if  he  were  really  serious, 
the  Seer  could  not  be  so  lacking  in  perception  as 
to  be  blind  to  the  prodigious  interest  of  all  this. 
Even  were  the  document  no  older  than  1890, 
such  a  forecast  of  fighting  in  the  air,  theologians' 
manifestos,  combatant  priests,  a  newly-elected 
Pope  named  Benedict,  etc.,  would  make  it,  as 
already  pointed  out,  the  most  wonderful  pro- 
phecy ever  heard  of.  But  supposing  it  to  date 
from  1600,  the  revelation  becomes  stupendous. 
There  would  not  be  a  word  of  this  marvellous 
text  which  we  could  spare.  We  should  want  to 
have  it  all  before  us  in  facsimile  in  order  that 
from  the  measure  of  its  fulfilment  in  the  past  we 
might  learn  how  far  we  might  rely  with  safety 


The  Seer's  Rhapsody  61 

upon  its  exhilarating  promise  of  victory  in  the 
future. 

But  it  is  absurd  to  labour  the  point.  M. 
Peladan,  in  spite  of  his  fantastic  allures,  is  much 
too  shrewd  a  man  to  be  blind  to  all  this.  It  is 
probable  enough  that  he  found  among  his 
father's  papers  some  rather  lurid  prediction  con- 
cerning Antichrist  and  a  great  battle  in  which 
the  cock  and  the  leopard  all  played  their  parts. 
There  were  hundreds  of  such  documents  circulat- 
ing in  the  seventeenth  century — extracts  from 
one  or  two  will  be  given  later  on — and  since  then 
the  number  has  continually  been  added  to.  From 
the  evidence  of  a  certain  Madame  Faust1  it  is 
clear  enough  that  more  than  twenty  years  ago 
M .  Pe"  ladan  was  accustomed  to  deliver  some  such 
"  Prophecy  of  the  Twentieth  Century  "  as  a 
recitation.  A  seer  has  to  justify  his  seership. 
France  dreamed  of  the  revanche  long  before 
1890,  and  an  identification  of  the  Lutheran 
monarch  with  Antichrist,  a  figurative  description 
of  an  awful  conflict  among  the  beasts  ending 
with  the  victory  of  France  and  the  Lamb  would 
have  been  readily  welcomed  by  most  of  the 
audiences  which  M.  Peladan  had  to  address. 
No  doubt  he  at  that  time  acquired  the  habit — 
there  was  no  particular  reason  why  he  should 
not — of  adapting  the  details  of  his  weird  pro- 
phetic rhapsody  to  the  hopes  and  sympathies  of 

1  See  the  Occult  Re-view,  December,  1914,  p.  ii,  and  Light, 
December  5th  and  i2th,  pp.  587  and  594. 


62  "Brother  Johannes'* 

his  hearers.  Naturally  enough  the  crisis  of  last 
September  revived  the  idea  in  his  mind,  and,  lo  ! 
we  have  a  hastily  elaborated  recension1  of  the 
old  Antichrist  prophecy,  adjusted  to  modern  con- 
ditions, appearing  in  the  columns  of  the  Figaro. 
There  is  not  a  scrap  of  evidence  forthcoming  to 
show  that  any  one  of  the  really  significant 
features  of  the  present  document,  e.g.,  the  name 
of  the  Pope,  the  priests  as  combatants,  the  con- 
test in  the  air,  etc.,  is  older  than  the  declaration 
of  war  in  August,  1914.  Be  it  noted  also  in 
passing,  a  propos  of  the  contest  in  the  air  (v.  19) 
that  the  enumeration  of  the  four  elements  in- 
volves a  blunder  of  which  no  seventeenth  century 
author  could  possibly  have  been  guilty.  I  hold, 
then,  that  the  significant  part  of  the  prediction 
is  of  the  same  alloy  as  the  prophecy  of  Orval  and 
other  similar  fabrications.  The  foundation  docu- 
ment may  be  relatively  ancient,  but  even  this  has 
very  probably  been  modified  in  transmission  in 
accordance  with  the  ideas  of  those  who  copied  it 
or  edited  it.  For  this  reason  I  do  not  think  that 
we  can  attach  the  slightest  importance  to  the 
statements  of  those  who  vaguely  assert  that  they 

1  The  signs  of  carelessness  in  the  adaptation  are  unmistak- 
able. From  v.  7  it  is  plain  that  the  original  prophet,  if  he 
identified  Antichrist  with  any  German  Emperor,  identified  him 
with  William  I  ;  only  William  I  could  have  "  made  war  on  a 
French  sovereign."  Again  v.  12  declares  that  the  new  Pope  is  to 
be  elected  at  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Antichrist,  but  William 
II  succeeded  to  the  throne  in  1888.  Further,  the  date  "  about 
the  year  2000 "  (v.  18)  is  utterly  irreconcilable  with  either 
William  I  or  William  II. 


The  Prophet's  Strange  Omissions    63 

have  previously  seen  the  prediction  in  print  or 
heard  it  read  aloud.  Not  one  person  in  a 
thousand  possesses  so  exact  a  memory  as  to  be 
able  to  identify  the  peculiarities  of  a  text  casually 
listened  to  or  examined  a  dozen  years  ago,  when 
there  are  scores  of  similar  documents  with  which 
it  might  be  confused. 

Only  one  point  remains  which  seems  to  call 
for  notice,  and  that  is  the  remarkable  silence  of 
"  Brother  Johannes "  regarding  all  those 
developments  of  the  war  which  could  not  have  J  y* 
been  foreseen  in  September,  1914.  Of  the  trench 
fighting  and  the  consequent  deadlock  of  the 
great  armies,  of  the  blockade  by  submarine,  of 
Germany's  cry  for  food,  not  a  word  is  said; 
even  Belgium  is  not  so  much  as  mentioned. 
For  us  the  tragedy  of  Belgium  remains  at 
present  the  most  appalling  horror  of  the 
war,  but  on  September  loth  the  tragedy  of 
Belgium  had  not  been  consummated.  Antwerp 
was  still  deemed  impregnable,  and  it  must 
have  been  before  September  loth,  probably 
some  time  before  that  date,  that  Mr.  PeUadan 
sent  off  his  manuscript  to  the  editor  of  the 
Figaro . 

I  have  spent  some  time  over  this  "  prophecy 
of  Brother  Johannes,"  utterly  foolish  as  I  con- 
sider it  to  be,  simply  because  it  has  had  so  much 
vogue  and  because  it  has  been  championed  by 
presumably  serious  people,  who  do  not  scruple 
to  maintain  that  its  genuineness  is  conclusively 


64  "Brother  Johannes " 

established  by  evidence.1  It  only  remains  to 
give  an  illustration  of  the  type  of  predictions 
which  found  favour  in  the  seventeenth  century. 
Both  as  an  example  of  the  tendency  to  father 
these  extravagant  inventions  on  famous  ecclesi- 
astics, and  to  provide  an  instance  of  the  figura- 
tive use  of  beasts  in  political  allegory,  I  may 
quote  an  extravagant  prophecy,  published  in  the 
year  of  the  great  fire  of  London,  under  the  name 
of  St.  Thomas  Becket,  the  martyred  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury.  It  runs  as  follows  : 

The  Lily  (France)  shall  remain  in  the  better  part, 
and  shall  enter  into  the  land  of  the  Lion  (Holland), 
they  wanting  his  assistance,  which  the  beasts  of  his 
own  kingdom  shall  tear  with  their  teeth  and  shall 
stand  in  the  field  among  the  thorns  of  his  kingdom. 
At  length  shall  the  Son  of  Man  (England)  come  with 
a  great  army,  passing  the  waters,  carrying  wild 
beasts  in  his  arms,  whose  kingdom  is  in  the  land  of 
wool,  and  feared  by  the  whole  world.  The  Eagle 
(Germany)  shall  come  out  of  the  East  with  his  wings 
spread  upon  the  sun,  with  a  great  multitude  of  his 
people  to  the  help  of  the  Son  of  Man.  In  that  year 
camps  shall  be  torn,  great  fear  shall  be  in  the  world, 
and  in  some  part  of  the  land  of  the  Lion  shall  war  be 
amongst  many  kings,  and  there  shall  be  a  flood  of 
blood.  The  Lily  shall  lose  his  crown  with  which  the 
Son  of  Man  shall  be  crowned.  And  for  four  follow- 
ing years  shall  there  be  many  battles  amongst 

1  See  in  particular  The  End  of  the  Kaiser,  a  brochure  by  Mr. 
Ralph  Shirley,  the  editor  of  the  Occult  Review.  The  December 
number  of  this  journal  had  a  label  posted  on  it :  "  ANTICHRIST 
AND  THE  KAISER,  THE  PROPHECY  PROVED  GENUINE,  BY  THE 
EDITOR." 


Allegorical  Beasts  65 

Christians.  Part  of  the  world  shall  be  destroyed; 
the  Head  of  the  World  (Pope  or  Turk)  shall  be  to  the 
earth.  The  Son  of  Man  and  the  Eagle  shall  prevail, 
and  then  there  shall  be  peace  over  the  whole  face  of 
the  earth.  Then  shall  the  Son  of  Man  receive  a 
wonderful  sign,  and  shall  go  into  the  land  of 
promise.1 

Extravagant  though  this  may  be,  it  is  interest- 
ing to  note  that  even  in  a  native  English  pam- 
phlet "  the  land  of  the  Lion  is  used  to  designate 
not  England  but  the  Netherlands  or  Flanders, 
while  the  animals  blazoned  on  the  shield  of  the 
King  of  England  are  described  as  '  wild 
beasts.'  "  French  heralds,  indeed,  have  always 
called  them  leopards,  and  they  are  so  designated 
in  French  armorials  to  this  day.*  It  will  be 
understood,  therefore,  that  no  objection  can  be 
raised  against  M.  P&adan's  prophecy  on  the 
ground  of  its  identifying  England  with  the 
Leopard,  France  with  the  Cock,  or  Germany 
with  the  Eagle.3  My  contention  only  is  that, 

1  The  Prophecies  of  Thomas  Becket,  lately  found  in  an 
ancient  Manuscript  at  Abington  by  Dr.  Ailsworth,  London, 
1666.  Both  the  rather  incoherent  wording  and  the  interpreta- 
tions in  brackets  belong  to  the  original  pamphlet. 

3  We  are  told  in  the  Nouveau  Larousse  (1902)  "  the  heraldic 
leopard  is  a  lion  which,  instead  of  being  rampant,  is  passant, 
and  the  head  of  which  faces  the  spectator,"  and  similarly  the 
authoritative  Dictionnaire  archeologique  et  explicatif  de  la 
Science  du  Blason,  by  Comte  A.  O'Kelly,  describes  the  English 
royal  arms  with  which  we  are  all  familiar  as  de  gueules,  a  trois 
Uopards  d'or  (gules,  three  leopards  or). 

*  The  prophecies,  circulated  in  the  sixteenth  century  under 
the  names  of  Johann  Liechtenberger  and  Johann  Carionis,  are 
full  of  similar  political  allegories  under  the  disguise  of  beasts, 


66  "Brother  Johannes" 

having  taken  an  ancient  prediction  about  Anti- 
christ from  no  one  knows  where,  he  has  so  modi- 
fied it  and  changed  its  character  as  to  make  it 
say  whatever  seemed  to  him  desirable. 

As  a  final  illustration  of  the  vogue  of  this  kind 
of  allegory  among  the  prophets  and  prophecy- 
mongers  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  following 
passage,  which  I  translate  from  its  Latin  original, 
may  also  be  cited.  Curiously  enough  it  comes  to 
us  through  a  certain  Johannes  (Johannes 
Wolfius),  a  Lutheran,  who  made  a  prodigious 
collection  of  oracles  and  portents,  and  who 
published  them  in  two  folio  volumes  printed  in 
the  year  1600.  The  prophecy  itself,  however, 
professes  to  have  been  written  in  1498. 

The  Eagle  shall  fly,  and  by  his  flight  shall  be  over- 
thrown the  Lion,  who  will  reign  at  Jerusalem  for  seven 
years.  At  length  the  princes  of  Germany  will  con- 
spire together  and  the  chief  men  of  Bohemia  shall  be 
crushed.  And  the  Leopard  will  devour  him.  Then 
a  king-  shall  arise  of  the  stock  of  the  eastern  Eagle, 
and  there  will  come  the  offspring-  of  the  Eagle  and 
will  build  its  nest  in  the  house  of  the  Lion,  and  it  will 
be  destitute  of  all  fruit  or  nourishment  from  its  father. 
And  a  king  shall  be  chosen  to  whom  is  not  paid  the 
honour  due  to  a  king.  He  shall  reign,  and  ruling 
mightily  shall  hold  sway  and  will  stretch  his  branches 
to  the  uttermost  limits  of  the  earth.  In  his  time  the 
Sovereign  Pontiff  shall  be  made  prisoner  and  the 

etc.  We  read  there  of  black  eagles  and  young  eagles,  golden 
lions  and  white  lions,  cocks,  wolves,  foxes,  lilies,  etc.  But 
I  have  not  hit  upon  any  which  bears  a  true  resemblance  in 
substance  to  the  disclosures  of  "  Brother  Johannes." 


Black  Magic  67 

clergy  shall  be  plundered,  for  they  corrupt  the  faith. 
Alas  for  the  evil  lives  of  the  clergy  I1 

The  incoherence  of  these  predictions  belongs 
to  the  original,  and  is  probably  intentional. 
Johannes  Wolfius  quotes  them,  as  he  does  many 
others,  with  a  distinct  controversial  animus 
against  the  Church  of  Rome. 

In  taking  leave  of  M.  Peladan,  the  exploiter  of 
this  "  Brother  Johannes  "  prophecy,  it  is  worth 
while  to  notice  that  he  stands  charged — amongst 
others  by  the  late  J.  K.  Huysmans,  the  author  of 
En  Route — with  engaging  in  the  practice  of 
black  magic  in  a  serious  and  malignant  form.3  I 
do  not  propose  to  discuss  here  the  unpleasant  sub- 
ject of  "Satanism,"  but  whether  the  hideous 
rites  ascribed  to  the  cult  are  real,  or  only 
imaginary,  the  atmosphere  created  by  these  sur- 
roundings unquestionably  leaves  a  certain  moral 
stigma  attaching  to  all  who  allow  their  names  to 
be  prominently  associated  with  it. 

1  Johannes  Wolfius,  Lectionum  Memorabilium  et  Recondi- 
tarum  Centenarii  XVI  (Lavingae,  1600),  vol.  i,  p.  722. 

3  See  Joanny  Bricaud,  /.  K.  Huysmans  et  le  Satanisme, 
Paris,  1913.  Huysmans  writes  :  "  II  est  indiscutable  que  de 
Guaita  et  Pe'ladan  pratiquent  quotidiennement  la  magie  noire." 
Bricaud,  p.  50,  and  cf.  pp.  29  and  37-8. 


CHAPTER  IV 

ARMAGEDDON   AND   THE   END    OF   WAR 


H 


ARDLY  any  feature  is  of  such 
common  occurrence  in  the  pro- 
phecies of  all  countries  and  all 
periods  as  the  prediction  of  some 
great  conflict  of  the  nations, 
which  generally  ends,  after  terrible  sufferings, 
in  the  final  triumph  of  religion  and  justice. 
These  ideas  were  no  doubt  largely  inspired 
by  the  traditional  interpretation  of  Armaged- 
don in  the  Apocalypse  (xvi.  16)  as  the  scene 
of  the  ultimate  contest  between  the  powers 
of  good  and  evil.  As  to  the  rightfulness 
of  that  interpretation  this  is  not  the  place  to 
inquire,  but  it  permeated  all  Christian  literature 
and  it  gave  birth  to  a  number  of  what  may  be 
called  folk-tales,  supposing  the  word  tale  to 
mean  simply  a  thing  told  and  to  be  capable  of 
referring  to  the  future  as  well  as  to  the  past. 
There  is  in  particular  a  whole  group  of  these 
folk-tales  which  come  from  Germany  and  which, 
while  assuming  a  good  many  different  forms, 
centre  in  an  incident  commonly  known  as  "  the 
Battle  of  the  Birch  Tree  "—die  Schlacht  am 
Birkenbaum.  The  prophecy  is  in  any  case  an 

68 


The  Battle  of  the  Birch  Tree       69 

interesting  piece  of  folk-lore,  and  I  may  give  it 
here  in  what  is  perhaps  its  most  authentic  shape, 
as  it  was  translated  more  than  sixty  years  ago 
in  Blackwood's  Magazine. 

A  time  shall  come  when  the  world  shall  be  godless. 
The  people  will  strive  to  be  independent  of  king  and 
magistrate,  subjects  will  be  unfaithful  to  their  princes. 
It  will  then  come  to  a  general  insurrection  when 
father  shall  fight  against  son  and  son  against  father. 
In  that  time  men  shall  try  to  pervert  the  articles  of 
the  faith  and  shall  introduce  new  books.  The  Catholic 
religion  shall  be  hard  pressed,  and  men  will  try 
with  cunning  to  abolish  it.  Men  shall  love  play  and 
jest  and  pleasure  of  all  kinds  at  that  time.  But  then 
it  shall  not  be  long  before  a  change  occurs.  A 
frightful  war  will  break  out.  On  one  side  shall 
stand  Russia,  Sweden,  and  the  whole  north,  on 
the  other  France,  Spain,  Italy,  and  the  whole 
south  under  a  powerful  prince.  This  prince  shall 
come  from  the  south.  He  wears  a  white  coat  with 
buttons  all  the  way  down.  He  has  a  cross  on  his 
breast,  rides  a  grey  horse,  which  he  mounts  from 
his  left  side,  because  he  is  lame  of  one  foot.  He 
will  bring  peace.  Great  is  his  severity,  for  he  will 
put  down  all  dance-music  and  rich  attire.  He  will 
hear  morning  Mass1  in  the  church  of  Bremen.  From 
Bremen  he  rides  to  the  Haar  (an  eminence  near 
Werl),  from  thence  he  looks  with  his  spy-glass 
towards  the  country  of  the  Birch-tree  and  observes 
the  enemy.  Next  he  rides  past  Holtum  (a  village 
near  Werl).  At  Holtum  stands  a  crucifix  between 
two  lime-trees ;  before  this  he  kneels  and  prays  with 

1  Some  copies  apparently  read,  "  he  will  say  (lesen)  Mass." 
F 


yo  The  End  of  War 

outstretched  arms  for  some  time.  Then  he  leads  his 
soldiers,  clad  in  white,  into  the  battle,  and  after  a 
bloody  contest  he  remains  victorious. 

The  chief  slaughter  will  take  place  at  a  brook 
which  runs  from  west  to  east.  Woe !  woe !  to 
Budberg  and  Sondern  in  those  days.  The  victorious 
leader  shall  assemble  the  people  after  the  battle  and 
harangue  them  in  the  church.1 

So  runs  the  best-known  version  of  dieSchlacht 
am  Birkenbaum,  and  it  is  perhaps  a  little  curious 
that  the  district  which  tradition  has  assigned 
for  the  battle-field  of  this  momentous  contest 
is  pointed  to  by  military  authorities  as  the 
scene  of  the  last  desperate  struggle  between 
Germany  and  a  western  invader.  So  at  any 
rate,  says  Commander  Driant,  in  his  preface 
to  a  clever  forecast  of  the  war  now  raging, 
which  was  published  by  M.  de  Civrieux  a  couple 
of  years  back.3  The  district  of  Westphalia 
marked  out  by  the  mention  of  such  places  as 
Werl,  Holtum,  Bremen,  Budberg,  etc.,  is  about 
forty  miles  east  of  the  great  Krupp  ordinance 
works  at  Essen.  Still  more  remarkable  at  first 
sight  is  the  fact  that  the  conqueror  is  to  be  a 
man  clothed  in  a  white  coat  with  buttons  all  the 
way  down,  who  mounts  his  horse  on  the  wrong 

1  The  original  German  may  be  found  in  Das  Buch  der  Wahr- 
und  Weissagungen  (Regensburg,  1884),  pp.  222-3,  or  again  in 
C.  B.  Warnefried,  Seherblicke  in  die  Zukunft  (Regensburg, 
1861),  pt.  ii,  pp.  59-60.  The  above  translation  is  taken  from 
Blackwood's  Magazine,  May,  1850,  p.  568. 

3  La  Fin  de  I'Empire  allemande — la  Bataille  du  Champ  des 
Bouleaux,  par  M.  de  Civrieux,  Paris,  1912. 


Jaspers  7 1 

side.  The  present  Kaiser,  as  is  generally  known, 
owing  to  an  injury  at  birth,  has  not  the  full  use 
of  his  left  arm,  and  is  consequently  compelled 
to  climb  into  the  saddle  from  the  off  side. 
Still  a  moment's  consideration  of  the  prophecy 
shows  clearly  how  trivial  the  coincidence  is. 
The  victorious  prince  is  the  leader,  not  of  Ger- 
many, but  of  France  and  Spain  and  Italy,  a 
Catholic  who  hears  or  even  says  Mass,  and  who 
prays  before  a  crucifix;  while  the  injured  limb 
is  not  his  arm  but  his  foot.  Coincidences  of 
this  superficial  kind  must  now  and  again  occur 
in  all  such  predictions,  and  if  we  accept  them  as 
proof  of  supernatural  insight,  there  will  be  no 
limit  to  the  extravagances  into  which  we  shall 
be  led. 

Other  variants  of  the  prophecy  just  quoted 
continued  to  be  repeated  until  quite  modern 
times.  In  particular  a  man  named  Jaspers,  a 
Westphalian  shepherd,  of  Deininghausen,  is 
said  in  the  year  1830,  shortly  before  his  death, 
to  have  made  a  public  prediction  to  this  effect : 

A  great  road  will  be  carried  through  our  country 
from  West  to  East  which  will  pass  through  the 
forest  of  Bodelschwingh.  On  this  road  carriages 
will  run  without  horses  and  cause  a  dreadful  noise. 
At  the  commencement  of  this  work  a  great  scarcity 
will  prevail,  pigs  will  become  very  dear,  and  a  new 
religion  will  arise  in  which  wickedness  will  be  re- 
garded as  prudence  and  good  manners.  Before  this 
road  is  quite  completed  a  frightful  war  will  break  out. 


72  The  End  of  War 

In  1830  not  even  the  first  English  railway  had 
been  opened,  but  before  1848  a  railway  had  been 
constructed  in  the  part  of  Westphalia  spoken  of. 
There  was  also  about  this  time  a  great  scarcity, 
and  the  bringing  of  workmen  into  the  country 
led  to  a  deterioration  of  morals  among  the 
peasantry  which  might  have  been  described  as  a 
new  religion.  All  this  sounds  very  promising, 
but  what  follows  of  Jaspers5  prophesyings, 
though  vaguely  echoing  the  Birkenbaum  pre- 
dictions, is  sadly  disappointing  when  compared 
with  the  actual  history  of  the  years  1850-70. 

1 .  Before  the  great  road  is  quite  finished  a  dreadful 
war  will  break  out. 

2.  A  small  northern  power  will  be  the  conqueror. 

3.  After  this  another  war  will  break  out,  not  a 
religious  war  among  Christians,  but  between  those 
who  believe  in  Christ  and  those  who  do  not  believe. 

4.  The  war  comes   from  the  East;   I   dread  the 
East. 

5.  The  war  will  break  out  very  suddenly.     In  the 
evening  they  will  say  Peace,  peace  !  and  yet  peace 
is  not ;  and  in  the  morning  the  enemy  will  be  at  the 
door.     Yet  it  shall  soon  pass,  and  he  who  knows  a 
good  hiding-place,  even  for  only  a  few  days,  will  be 
secure. 

6.  The  defeated  enemy  will  have  to  fly  in  extreme 
haste.     Let  the  people  cast  cart  and  wheels  into  the 
water,  otherwise  the  flying  foe  will  take  all  vehicles 
with  them. 

No  disturbance  of  this  kind  has  certainly 
taken  place  in  Westphalia  from  Jaspers*  day  to 


Westphalian  Folk  Predictions       73 

the  present;  while  on  the  other  hand  it  must  be 
plain  that  the  circumstances  described  in  no 
way  correspond  with  anything  possible  in  the 
war  now  raging.  Prophecies  that  have  missed 
the  mark  are  almost  as  uninteresting  as  a  ten- 
year-old  Bradshaw,  and  if  I  quote  any  further 
details  it  is  only  to  indicate  how  little  trust  can 
be  placed  in  the  precisely  similar  details  which 
are  found  in  other  prophecies.  Thus  Jaspers 
declares  : 

9.  The  great  battle  will  be  fought  at  the  Birch-tree 
between  Unna,  Hamm,  and  Werl.     The  people  of 
half  the  world  will  there  stand  arrayed  against  each 
other.     God   will  terrify  the  enemy  by  a  dreadful 
storm.     Of  the  Russians  but  few  shall  return  home 
to  tell  of  their  defeat. 

10.  The  war  will  be  over  in  1850,  and  in  1852  all 
will  be  again  in  order.1 

11.  The   Poles  are  at  first  put  down;   but   they 
will,   along  with  other  nations,   fight  against  their 
oppressors  and  at  last  obtain  a  king  of  their  own. 

12.  France  will  be  divided   internally  into   three 
parts. 

13.  Spain    will    not    join    in    the    war,    but    the 
Spaniards  shall  come  after  it  is  over  and  take  posses- 
sion of  the  churches. 

14.  Austria  will  be  fortunate,  provided  she  do  not 
wait  too  long. 

15.  The  papal  chair  will  be  vacant  for  a  time.8 

1  The  article  in  Blackwood  from  which  I  borrow  this  trans- 
lation was  printed  in  May,  1850,  and  had  probably  been  written 
earlier. 

1  Blackwood's  Magazine,  May,  1850,  pp.  583-4. 


74  The  End  of  War 

Somewhat  more  desultory,  but  even  more 
terrific,  are  such  oracles  as  the  following,  ex- 
tracted from  old  Westphalian  traditions  in  1849 
by  Thomas  Beykirch  : 

Alas  !  once  happy  Cologne  !  when  thou  art  well- 
paved  thou  shalt  perish  in  thine  own  blood.  O 
Cologne !  Thou  shalt  perish  like  Sodom  and 
Gomorrha ;  thy  stream  shall  flow  with  blood  and  thy 
relics  shall  be  taken  away.  Woe  to  thee,  Cologne  ! 
because  strangers  suck  thy  breasts  and  the  breasts 
of  thy  poor — of  thy  poor  who  therefore  languish  in 
destitution  and  misery.1 

Or,  again  : 

Woe !  woe !  Where  Rhine  and  Moselle  meet  a 
battle  shall  be  fought  against  Turks  and  Baschkirs 
(Russians?)  so  bloody  that  the  Rhine  shall  be  dyed 
red  for  twenty-five  leagues.1 

Such  predictions  as  these,  however,  were  no 
doubt  found  unsatisfactory  for  many  reasons. 
It  was  necessary  to  bring  them  up  to  date  and 
to  adapt  them  to  present  circumstances  if  they 
were  to  find  any  general  acceptance.  We  have, 
I  think,  a  characteristic  example  of  this  proce- 
dure in  a  document  published  by  the  Matin  on 
August  23rd,  1914.  It  was  then  described  as 
"The  famous  Prophecy  of  Mayence,"  and  was 
stated  to  date  from  1854,  but  no  indication  was 
given  of  any  book  printed  in  1854  in  which  it 

1  This  is  said  to  have  been  found  by  Heinrich  von  Juddon 
in  a  religious  house  of  the  Carmelites. 

1  See  Beykirch,  Prophetenstimmen  and  Blackwood,  I.e.,  p. 
567- 


A  bogus  "Prophecy  of  Maycnce"   75 

could  be  found,  and  we  may  venture  to  remain 
sceptical  about  this  fact  until  more  particulars 
are  furnished.  As  is  the  case  with  so  many  other 
bogus  predictions,  the  prophecy  claims  credit  for 
itself  on  the  ground  that  its  earlier  forecasts  had 
already  been  fulfilled  with  startling  exactitude. 
In  the  particular  instance  of  this  Mayence  docu- 
ment verses  5-7  provide  a  marvellous  account  of 
the  central  incidents  of  the  Franco-Prussian 
War. 

5.  Napoleon  III  at  first  despising  his  adversary, 
will  fly  very  soon  towards  the  "  Chesne-Populeux  " 
(near  Sedan)  9  where  he  will  disappear  never  to  appear 
again. 

6.  In  spite  of  the  heroic  resistance  of  the  French, 
a  number  of  soldiers,  blue,  yellow,  and  black,  will 
spread  themselves  over  a  great  part  of  France. 

7.  Alsace    and    Lorraine    will    be    wrested    from 
France  for  a  time  and  a  half. 

Certainly  if  this  prophecy  of  Mayence  was 
really  in  circulation  in  1854,  its  accuracy  as 
regards  these  earlier  events  is  very  astonishing 
indeed.  The  extraordinary  thing  is  that  though 
it  had  been  already  famous  in  1854  and  had 
been  so  marvellously  verified  in  1870,  it  makes 
no  appearance  in  any  of  the  elaborate  collections 
of  similar  materials  such  as  the  Voix  Prophet- 
iques  and  Le  Grand  Pape  et  le  Grand  Roi,  the 
editors  of  which  in  1871  and  1872  scoured  heaven 
and  earth  in  the  intervals  between  their  succes- 
sive editions  to  add  new  documents  to  their 


76  The  End  of  War 

store.  It  seems,  then,  practically  certain  that, 
like  so  many  others,  the  prophecy  of  Mayence 
is  a  fake,  but  it  is  interesting  to  note  how  in  the 
nine  concluding  verses,  which  presumably  have 
reference  to  the  war  now  raging,  the  materials 
available  in  the  old  "  Battle  of  the  Birch  Tree  " 
saga  have  been  turned  to  account.  I  quote  the 
translation  published  in  The  Referee  (August 
3Oth,  1914),  which,  like  many  other  newspapers, 
professed  to  treat  the  document  quite  seriously. 

10.  Courage,  faithful  souls,  the  reign  of  the  dark 
shadow  shall  not  have  time  to  execute  all  its  schemes. 

n.  But  the  time  of  mercy  approaches.  A  prince 
of  the  nation  is  in  your  midst. 

12.  It  is  the  man  of  salvation,  the  wise,  the  in- 
vincible,   he    shall    count    his    enterprises    by    his 
victories. 

13.  He  shall  drive  out  the  enemy  of  France,  he 
shall  march  to  victory  on  victory,  until  the  day  of 
divine  justice. 

14.  That  day  he  shall  command  seven  kinds  of 
soldiers   against  three   to   the   quarter  of   Bouleaux 
between  Ham,  Werl,  and  Paderborn. 

15.  Woe  to  thee,  people  of  the  North,  thy  seventh 
generation  shall  answer  for  all  thy  crimes.     Woe  to 
thee,  people  of  the  East,  thou  shalt  spread  afar  the 
cries  of  affliction  and  innocent  blood.     Never  shall 
such  an  army  be  seen. 

16.  Three  days  the  sun  shall  rise  upwards  on  the 
heads  of  the  combatants  without  being  seen  through 
the  clouds  of  smoke. 

17.  Then   the   commander   shall   get  the   victory; 


Hermann  of  Lehnin  77 

two  of  his  enemies  shall  be  annihilated,  the  remainder 
of  the  three  shall  fly  towards  the  extreme  East. 

1 8.  William,  the  second  of  the  name,  shall  be  the 
last  King  of  Prussia.  He  shall  have  no  other  suc- 
cessors save  a  King  of  Poland,  a  King  of  Hanover, 
and  a  King  of  Saxony. 

The  seven  kinds  of  soldiers  appear  to  be 
English,  French,  Russians,  Belgians,  Servians, 
Austrians,  and  Hungarians.  By  the  "  people 
of  the  North  "  Prussia  is  plainly  indicated,  by 
the  "people  of  the  East"  Austria.  It  is  pre- 
sumably the  Tsar  who  figures  as  "  the  man  of 
salvation,"  but  it  would  be  futile  to  speculate 
about  the  details. 

The  point  of  chief  interest  is  the  fact  that  such 
Westphalian  townships  as  Ham,  Werl,  and 
Paderborn  are  mentioned,  and  that  the  trans- 
lator, being  apparently  unaware  that  bouleau 
means  a  birch-tree,  has  turned  it  into  a  proper 
name  (v.  14).  The  last  verse  also  apparently 
betrays  adaptation  from  some  older  source. 
Prussia  as  a  separate  monarchy  is  of  little  in- 
terest now.  The  famous  prophecy  of  Hermann 
of  Lehnin  which,  while  professing  to  be  the  work 
of  a  mediaeval  monk,  was  probably  fabricated 
about  1690,  long  ago  said  : 

Tandem  sceptra  gerit,  qui  stemmatis  ultimus  erit. 
At  length  he  sways  the  sceptre  who  will  be  the 
last  of  his  race. 

But   this   should   properly   apply   to   Frederick 
William  IV,  and  the  defenders  of  Hermann's 


78  The  End-of  War 

prophecy  explain  it  by  saying  that  Frederick 
William  IV.  was  really  the  last  king  of  Prussia, 
for  his  brother  William  I,  who  succeeded  him, 
became  Emperor  of  Germany.  By  his  change  of 
title,  they  contend,  the  kingdom  of  Prussia  was 
virtually  extinguished. 

Unquestionably  the  interpreters  of  the  pro- 
phets, whether  modern  or  ancient,  are  driven  to 
hard  shifts,  and  I  may  state  here  in  concluding 
that  part  of  our  investigation  which  bears 
specially  on  the  great  war,  that  of  all  the  utter- 
ances which  I  have  examined  concerning  the 
results  of  the  contest  only  two  have  seemed  to 
suggest  even  a  vague  possibility  that  the  pro- 
phet possessed  intuitions  which  transcended  the 
limitations  of  ordinary  prudent  conjecture. 
Moreover,  the  first  of  these,  when  traced  to  its 
sources,  loses  all  its  verisimilitude.  Still  as  it  has 
an  interest  of  its  own  and  recalls  some  of  the 
features  of  certain  familiar  psychic  phenomena, 
it  may  be  recounted  here.  The  narrator  is  a 
certain  Father  Korzeniecki,  a  Polish  Dominican, 
who,  it  appears,  had  a  great  devotion  to  the  Jesuit 
martyr  Blessed  Andrew  Bobola,  put  to  death  by 
the  Cossacks  with  most  terrible  tortures  in  1637. 
The  incorrupt  body  of  Blessed  Andrew,  it  should 
be  noted,  passed,  on  the  suppression  of  the 
Society  of  Jesus,  into  the  keeping  of  the  Domi- 
nicans. One  night  in  the  year  1819  Father 
Korzeniecki,  overwhelmed  by  the  tribulations  of 
his  beloved  Poland,  was  engaged  in  prayer  to 


Blessed  Andrew  Bobola  and  Poland  79 

his  patron  when  he  saw  standing  by  him  a 
religious  in  a  Jesuit  habit,  who  bade  him  open 
his  window  and  look  out.  Instead  of  gazing 
upon  the  familiar  garden  of  the  convent,  he 
beheld  a  landscape  of  vast  extent  stretching  as 
far  as  the  eye  could  reach.  This,  he  was  given 
to  understand  by  the  apparition,  was  the  pro- 
vince of  Pinsk  in  which  he,  the  Blessed  Andrew, 
had  suffered  martyrdom,  and  then  the  Domini- 
can was  bidden  to  look  at  the  prospect  again. 

At  this  moment,  as  the  Father  viewed  the  scene  a 
second  time,  the  plain  seemed  to  him  suddenly 
covered  with  innumerable  hordes  of  Russians,  Turks, 
Frenchmen,  Englishmen,  Austrians,  Prussians,  and 
other  nations  beside,  which  the  Religious  could  not 
exactly  distinguish,  fighting  in  a  sanguinary  hand- 
to-hand  conflict  such  as  might  be  seen  in  a  war  of 
ruthless  extermination.  The  Father  was  aghast  and 
bewildered  by  the  horrible  spectacle. 

"When,"  said  the  Martyr,  "the  war  of  which 
you  have  just  seen  a  picture  shall  have  given  way  to 
peace,  then  Poland  shall  be  restored  and  I  shall  be 
recognized  as  its  principal  patron." 

It  is  certainly  a  curious  fact  that  English  and 
French  soldiers  should  have  been  given  a  promi- 
nent place  in  the  record  of  such  a  dream  or 
vision,  and  for  a  moment  the  coincidence  of  the 
Tsar's  declaration  of  liberty  for  Poland,  made 
at  the  beginning  of  the  present  war,  seems  rather 
remarkable.  Unfortunately,  however,  one  finds 
on  investigation  that  the  vision  first  attracted 
attention  at  the  opening  of  the  Crimean  War, 


80  The  End  of  War 

and  this,  I  am  afraid,  offers  an  only  too  satis- 
factory explanation  of  the  fact  that  Russians, 
Turks,  Frenchmen,  and  English  are  named  first 
among  the  motley  armies  that  were  seen  in  com- 
bat on  the  plains  of  Pinsk. 

The  second  prophecy  is  of  more  importance 
for  the  reason  that  it  is  not  entirely  explained 
by  the  circumstances  under  which  it  was  de- 
livered, and  that  it  still,  alas  !  retains  a  certain 
intrinsic  probability.  It  is,  moreover,  a  pre- 
diction to  which,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  no 
attention  has  yet  been  directed.  It  occurs  in  a 
little  English  Life  of  a  Carmelite  nun  known  as 
Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Crucified.  This  Life  was 
privately  printed  by  the  late  Lady  Herbert  of 
_Lea  in  1887,  and  the  preface  was  written  in  the 
March  of  that  year.1  It  would  be  no  libel  upon 
the  undoubted  services  rendered  by  Lady  Herbert 
to  Catholic  religious  literature  to  say  that  she 
was  not  always  a  conspicuously  accurate  writer. 
Nevertheless,  this  sketch  professes  on  its  title- 
page  to  be  "  taken  from  various  documents  pre- 
served in  the  Carmelite  monasteries  of  Pau  and 
Bethlehem,"  and  it  certainly  shows  a  consider- 
able dependence  on  pre-existing  materials.  It 
is  conceivable,  of  course,  that  the  author  may 
not  have  reproduced  the  data  so  furnished  with 
entire  fidelity,  but  if  she  altered  them,  there 
seems  no  assignable  reason  why  she  should 

1  A  Sketch  of  the  Life  of  Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Crucified,  by 
Lady  Herbert,  London,  printed  for  the  author,  1887. 


A  Carmelite  Ecstatica  81 

make  the  good  Carmelite  say  what  she  does 
make  her  say.  The  general  expectation  of 
Catholics  at  that  time  did  not  run  in  the  direction 
actually  followed,  but  rather  the  other  way.  The 
whole  tendency  was  to  anticipate,  not  to  retard, 
the  triumph  of  the  Church.  However,  let  me 
first  set  before  the  reader  the  two  passages  which 
have  a  bearing  on  our  present  subject,  only 
premising  that  Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Crucified 
(1846-78)  seems  to  have  been  a  mystic  whose 
religious  experiences  were  altogether  startling 
and  abnormal.  If  we  may  believe  her  confessor 
and  her  fellow-religious,  she  not  only  had  con- 
stant ecstasies,  but  she  was  for  several  years 
marked  with  the  stigmata  in  her  hands,  feet,  x 
and  side,  from  which  last  wound  on  every  Friday 
the  blood  flowed  freely.  On  several  occasions 
she  was  seen  suspended,  like  St.  Joseph  a 
Cupertino,  high  above  the  ground,  while  for 
many  months  together,  like  the  Blessed  Cure* 
d'Ars  and  numerous  other  saints,  she  is  said  to 
have  been  beaten  and  tormented  by  the  devil 
with  extraordinary  ferocity.  With  regard,  how- 
ever, to  her  prophecies,  which  alone  concern  us 
here,  the  two  following  passages  had  better  be 
transcribed  exactly  as  they  stand  in  Lady 
Herbert's  sketch  : 

One  day,  while  in  an  ecstasy,  she  saw  a  large 
church  in  which  were  many  altars.  On  the  principal 
one  was  a  beautiful  rose  with  a  delicious  perfume. 
This  she  was  made  to  understand  represented  Pius 


82  The  End  of  War 

IX.  Then  she  saw  two  kings  enter  the  church  with 
intent  to  destroy  the  rose,  but  they  failed.  One, 
however,  more  bold  than  the  rest,  tried  to  cut  it 
down,  but  in  vain;  and  he  said  to  himself:  "  In 
another  year."  A  little  time  seemed  to  elapse,  and 
then  she  again  saw  the  rose  attacked  by  the  two 
kings,  and  one  of  them  succeeded  in  bruising  it  and 
tearing  off  some  of  the  leaves.  But  afterwards  it 
rose  up  stronger  and  more  beautiful  than  before. 
St.  Elias  appeared  to  her  and  said:  "  Our  present 
Holy  Father  is  a  saint.  After  him  shall  come  another 
like  no  other;  he  shall  suffer  much  from  the  hands 
of  his  enemies.  The  third  Holy  Father  shall  be  the 
Seraphic.  The  fourth — alas  !  alas  !  there  is  and  shall 
be  no  cross  like  the  one  he  will  carry  !  But  the 
Church  will  begin  to  triumph  under  the  rule  of  this 

Holy  Father,  and  after  his  death  completely. 
I 

Now  such  manifestations,  supposing  them  to 

be  something  more  than  the  mere  illusions  of  a 
disordered  brain,  may  be  assumed  to  take  their 
colouring  from  the  mystic's  previous  beliefs  and 
habits  of  thought.  There  may  sometimes,  I 
hold,  be  a  real  intuition  of  a  spiritual  truth,  even 
though  the  setting  be  fantastic,  ridiculous,  or 
contrary  to  ascertained  fact.  Joan  of  Arc,  for 
example,  may  have  been  the  percipient  of  per- 
fectly authentic  voices  though  they  came  to  her 
through  a  St.  Catherine  whom  she  conceived  of 
according  to  a  legend  which  modern  historical 
criticism  has  now  exploded.  The  fact  that  St. 
Elias'  connection  with  the  Carmelites  must  be 
considered  more  than  problematical  would  not 


"  The  Fourth  Part  of  Men  "        83 

necessarily  discredit  all  the  communications  of  a 
revelation  attributed  by  a  Carmelite  nun  to  his 
intervention. 

But  the  second  passage  in  this  account  of 
Sister  Mary's  revelations  has  a  more  direct  bear- 
ing on  our  present  subject.  After  previously 
speaking  of  a  vision  of  a  dark  cloud  by  which 
in  1868  the  mystic  was  forewarned  of  the  Franco- 
Prussian  War  and  the  occupation  of  Rome,  the 
writer  continues  : 

Later  on  she  seemed  to  have  had  a  still  wider 
insight  into  the  future.  Again  she  saw  the  black 
cloud,  very  thick,  but  covering  not  only  France,  but 
the  whole  of  Europe.  Then  there  were  fearful  wars 
convulsing  every  part  of  Europe;  and  when  they 
were  over,  only  the  fourth  part  of  men  remained ; 
the  rest  had  all  perished  in  the  struggle.  "  At  that 
time,"  she  said,  "  the  priests  will  be  few  in  number, 
for  they  will  have  died  for  the  Faith  or  in  defence  of 
their  country.  There  will  be  sorrow  and  mourning 
everywhere  till  God's  anger  is  appeased."1 

Putting  these  two  forecasts  together  we  are  left 
to  infer  that  according  to  the  prophetic  intuitions 
of  this  strangely  favoured  mystic,  the  terrible 
time  of  war,  thus  foretold,  was  to  coincide  with 
the  pontificate  of  the  fourth  pope  of  her  vision, 
to  wit  Benedict  XV;  for  clearly  this  season  of 
calamity  must  precede  the  triumph  and  peace  of 
the  Church  which  is  to  begin  before  the  end  of 
his  reign,  and  such  an  awful  visitation  as  we 

1  A  Sketch  of  the  Life  of  Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Crucified,  by 
Lady  Herbert  (London,  1887),  pp.  34  and  36. 


84  The  End  of  War 

are  now  experiencing  would  very  well  explain 
the  words,  "  Alas  !  alas  !  there  is  and  shall  be 
no  cross  like  the  one  that  he  will  carry. " 

No  exact  indication  is  given  of  the  date  of 
these  revelations,  but  Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Cruci- 
fied died  in  August,  1878,  six  months,  that  is 
to  say,  after  the  election  of  Leo  XIII  and  five 
years  before  the  dream  of  a  great  Christian 
monarchy  was  shattered  for  most  French  Legiti- 
mists by  the  death  of  the  Comte  de  Chambord. 
I  lay  stress  on  this  because  if  the  quotations  just 
given  accurately  represent  the  predictions  made 
by  Sister  Mary,  she  was  not  echoing  the  ideas 
prevalent  among  the  French  religious  with 
whom  she  lived.  As  we  have  already  learned 
from  several  of  the  prophecies  previously  dis- 
cussed, the  whole  purport  of  such  publications 
as  the  Voix  Prophetiques  and  countless  others 
was  to  encourage  the  belief  that  even  before  the 
death  of  Pius  IX  the  Church  should  see  the 
dawn  of  a  happier  age.  Necessarily  this  view 
was  modified  after  the  accession  of  Leo  XIII, 
but  the  idea  of  a  comparatively  early  restoration 
still  persisted.  It  is  recorded  of  Palma,  the 
stigmatisee  of  Oria,  near  Brindisi,  that  shortly 
before  her  death  she  expressed  herself  in  terms 
which  one  of  the  ecclesiastical  magnates  of  the 
neighbourhood  thus  reported  to  Dr.  Imbert- 
Gourbeyre:1  "She  was  at  one  with  the  other 

1  Imbert-Gourbeyre,  La  Stigmatization  (Paris,  1894),  vol.  i, 
pp.  568-9. 


Defective  Evidence  85 

mystics  in  declaring  positively  that  Pope  Leo 
XIII  would  not  see  the  triumph  of  the  Church, 
but,  she  added,  his  successor  would  witness  it." 
Still  more  noteworthy  is  Sister  Mary's  prevision 
that  "  fearful  wars  should  convulse  every  part  of 
Europe  "  until  "  only  the  fourth  part  of  men 
(?  of  the  male  population)  remained,"  and  it  is 
certainly  curious  that  she  should  have  foreseen 
a  great  dearth  of  priests,  owing  in  part  to  the 
fact  that  many  had  died  "in  defence  of  their 
country."  There  was,  so  far  as  I  know,  no 
reason  in  1878  to  suppose  that  a  time  would 
ever  come  when  the  clergy  would  have  to  take 
part  in  battle  as  combatants. 

Nevertheless,  the  attempt  I  have  been  making 
to  find  something  which  can  be  put  forward  as 
a  genuine  prophecy  of  these  latter  times,  at  once 
encounters  a  serious  set-back  from  the  fact  that 
in  the  much  fuller  and  more  official  Life  of  Sister 
Mary  of  Jesus  Crucified,  published  in  1913, 1  the 
prediction  of  universal  war  and  the  destruction 
of  three  parts  of  men,  apparently  finds  no  place. 
Moreover,  the  vision  of  the  Popes  is  quite 
differently  narrated,  though  in  the  larger  Life, 
as  in  Lady  Herbert's  sketch,  the  revelation  is 
communicated  to  Sister  Mary  through  the  pro- 
phet St.  Elias,  and  the  date  of  the  vision  August, 
1867,  is  apparently  the  same.  In  the  longer  Life 

1  Vie  de  Soeur  Marie  de  ]esus  Crucifie,  par  le  R.  P.  Estrate 
(Paris,  Victor  Lecoffre,  1913),  pp.  xviii~4o8 ;  see  especially  p. 
197. 

G 


86  The  End  of  War 

nothing  is  said  of  "the  fourth  Pope,"  the 
present  Holy  Father.  On  the  contrary,  the 
phrase  "  there  is  and  shall  be  no  cross  like  the 
one  he  shall  carry  "  (in  the  French  il  n'y  aura 
pas  de  croix  comme  celle  qu'il  aura)  is  applied 
to  the  successor  of  Pius  IX,  i.e.,  Pope  Leo 
XIII.1 

Despite  these  difficulties,  the  gravity  of  which 
I  should  be  sorry  to  underrate,  I  am  not  altogether 
convinced  that  the  version  followed  by  Lady 
Herbert  is  without  authority.  To  begin  with, 
Lady  Herbert  must  have  had  some  text  before 
her,  and  she  can  have  had  no  possible  object  in 
altering  it  to  suit  a  much  more  distant  future. 
Secondly,  she  was  in  relation  with  contem- 
poraries of  the  ecstatica  probably  now  dead,  and 
we  know  for  certain  that  an  English  priest  as 
well  as  an  English  nun  who  had  at  one  time 
been  novice  mistress  to  Sister  Mary  were  among 
these  special  sources  of  information.  Thirdly, 
I  think  it  quite  as  likely  that  Pere  Estrate,  the 
author  of  the  French  Life,  or  those  who  edited 
it  after  his  death  in  1910,  would  have  felt  them- 
selves justified  in  expurgating  or  adapting  the 
texts  before  them  (especially  in  cases  where 
there  might  be  some  conflict  of  evidence),  as  that 
Lady  Herbert  herself  would  have  done  so.  It 
might  easily  have  happened,  for  example,  that 
the  idea  of  priests  laying  down  their  lives  as 

1  Vie  de  Sceur  Marie  de  J6sus  Crucifte,  par  le  R.  P.  Estrate 
(Paris),  p.  324. 


A  Prediction  verified  87 

combatants  in  defence  of  their  country  might 
have  been  considered  unseemly  by  Pere  Estrate 
when  he  first  compiled  the  biography  in  1889. 

On  the  other  hand  one  cannot  help  realizing 
that  the  forecast  of  the  four  Popes,  as  Lady 
Herbert  prints  it,  may  have  been  in  part  inspired 
by  the  prophecy  of  pseudo-Malachy.  The  de- 
scription of  the  third  Pontiff  (Pius  IX)  as  the 
"  Seraphic "  might  very  naturally  have  been 
suggested  by  his  motto  Ignis  ardens  (burning 
fire),  and  the  use  of  the  phrase  Religio  depopu- 
lata  (religion  laid  waste)  for  Benedict  XV  un- 
questionably calls  up  the  idea  of  a  period  of 
suffering  and  humiliation  for  the  Church  and 
her  ruler.  Still  there  is  no  hint  of  the  beginning 
of  victory  either  in  that  motto  or  in  its  successor 
Fides  intrepida. 

Without  attempting  to  decide  the  point,  it 
seems  in  any  case  certain  that  Sister  Mary  of 
Jesus  Crucified  was  regarded  by  her  fellow- 
religious  as  endowed  with  a  remarkable  gift  of 
prophecy.  The  fact  comes  out  clearly  in  a  letter 
which  Lady  Herbert  has  preserved,  written  by 
the  Carmelite  Mother  Prioress  at  Bayonne  to 
the  English  priest  above  referred  to.  Towards 
the  end  of  August,  1870,  a  colony  of  nine  Car- 
melite nuns  from  Pau  and  Bayonne,  the  ecstatica 
Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  being  one  of  the  number, 
sailed  from  Marseilles  to  establish  a  house  of  the 
Order  at  Mangalore  in  India.  The  letter,  which 
is  dated  September  2nd,  1870,  refers  to  this 


88  The  End  of  War 

rather  unusual  incident  in  Carmelite  history  in 
the  following  terms  : 

You  know,  dear  Father,  that  I  have  just  sent  off 
three  of  my  dear  children  to  the  Indian  missions 
with  the  Rev.  Mother  Mary  Elias  of  Pau  and  five  of 
her  daughters,  amongst  whom  is  my  saintly  child 
Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Crucified.  .  .  .  My  heart  and 
soul  are  with  my  dear  children.  Sister  Elias,  my 
Irish  lily,  is  one  of  the  three;  the  other  two  are 
Sister  Mary  of  the  Angels  and  Sister  Mary  of  St. 
Joseph.  I  hope  that  you  have  told  your  good  and 
reverend  brother  about  Sister  Mary  of  Jesus  Cruci- 
fied. You  may  now  do  so  freely.  She  is  far  away 
now  and  there  is  no  danger  of  its  doing  her  any 
harm.  I  have  been  to  Pau  with  my  children  and 
have  seen  and  heard  many  more  interesting  particu- 
lars about  her.  I  will  give  you  another  linen  steeped 
in  the  blood  which  flowed  from  her  stigmata  and 
which  is  to  perform  miracles.1  She  has  foretold  sad 
things  for  some  of  our  Sisters  who  have  sailed,  but 
they  are  in  the  hands  of  God. 

This  letter,  written  a  few  days  after  the  party 
set  sail,  confirms  the  explicit  statement  of  Pere 
Estrate  that  Sister  Mary  had  foretold  that  of  the 
nine  sisters  who  went,  three  would  never  live  to 
see  the  new  foundation.  In  point  of  fact,  Sisters 
Stephanie  and  Euphrasie  died  in  the  Red  Sea 

1  The  priest  in  question  believed  himself,  when  in  the  last 
stage  of  consumption,  to  have  been  miraculously  and  instan- 
taneously cured  by  one  of  these  linen  cloths.  If  the  original 
letter  was  in  French  the  phrase  "  which  is  to  perform  miracles  " 
may  represent  "  qui  doit  opeYer  des  miracles,"  which  is  not 
quite  the  same  thing. 


The  Language  of  Prophecy        89 

and  Mother  Elias  died  at  Calicut  before  reaching 
her  intended  destination.  If  we  may  trust  the 
accuracy  of  the  same  French  Life  several  other 
predictions  of  the  ecstatica  concerning  domestic 
events  and  the  future  of  individuals  were  fulfilled 
in  an  even  more  remarkable  way. 

Finally,  we  shall  do  well  to  remember  that  the 
language  of  prophecy  is  nearly  always  figurative 
and  grandiose.  If  He  who  is  the  Truth  and  the 
Light  could  describe  the  repose  of  His  sacred 
body  in  the  tomb  as  lasting  "  three  days  and 
three  nights  "  (Matt.  xii.  40),  we  are  certainly 
not  constrained  to  attach  an  absolutely  literal 
interpretation  to  such  phrases  as  "  the  fourth 
part  of  men  "  or  "  the  triumph  of  the  Church." 
Admitting,  as  we  may  do,  the  bare  possibility 
that  the  words  attributed  to  the  Carmelite 
ecstatica  may  have  been  inspired  by  some  true 
intuition  of  the  future,  we  cannot  safely  infer 
more  than  that  the  conclusion  of  this  terrible  war 
may  witness  a  revival  of  religious  faith  and  a 
period  of  comparative  peace  for  the  Church  in 
her  unending  struggle  against  principalities  and 
powers. 


CHAPTER  V 

DIVINERS  AND  SOOTHSAYERS 

O~J     August    3ist,     1914,     and    con- 
sequently quite  at  the  beginning 
of  the  present  war,  the  following 
letter  appeared  in  The  Times.    If 
we  may  judge  by  the  number  of 
allusions  to  it  which  one  has  come  across  since, 
the  forecast  contained  therein  must  have  attracted 
a  good  deal  of  attention. 

THE  EFFECT  OF  A  PROPHECY. 

SIR, — In  the  summer  of  1899  I  chanced  to  be 
sitting  with  the  present  German  Secretary  for  Foreign 
Affairs,  Herr  von  Jagow  (then  a  Secretary  of  the 
German  Embassy  in  Rome),  on  the  balcony  of  the 
Embassy,  the  Palazzo  Caffarelli,  on  the  Capitol.  In 
the  course  of  conversation  Herr  von  Jagow  expressed 
the  belief  that  no  general  European  war  was  likely 
to  occur  before  the  end  of  1913.  He  gave  as  his 
reason  the  influence  of  a  prophecy  made  to  the 
Kaiser's  grandfather,  Prince  William  of  Prussia,  at 
Mainz,  in  1849.  Prince  William  of  Prussia,  who 
was  proclaimed  German  Emperor  at  Versailles  on 
January  i8th,  1871,  was  in  1849  wandering  incognito 
in  the  Rhine  Provinces,  attended  only  by  an  aide-de- 
camp. He  had  incurred  great  unpopularity  by  his 
90 


Von  Jagow's  Gipsy  Story  gi 

attitude  during  the  Berlin  revolution  of  March,  1848, 
and  had  been  obliged  to  spend  some  time  in  England, 
whence   he   returned,    still    a   semi-fugitive,    to    the 
Rhineland.     At  Mainz  a  gipsy  woman  offered  to  tell 
him  his  fortune,  and  addressed  him  as   "  Imperial 
Majesty. ' '    Not  a  little  amused — for  at  that  moment 
his   chance    of    succeeding   even    to    the    throne   of 
Prussia  seemed  slight — the  Prince  asked,  "  '  Imperial 
Majesty,'   and  of  what  empire,   pray?  "     "Of  the 
new  German  Empire,"  was  the  reply.     "  And  when 
is  this  Empire  to  be  formed?  "  he  inquired.     The 
woman  took  a  scrap  of  paper  and  wrote  on  it  the 
year   1849.     Then  she  placed  the  same  figures  in 
column  beneath   .       .       .       .       .       .       .       1849 

i 
8 
4 
9 

and  adding  them  together  obtained  the  total     1871 

"  And  how  long  am  I  to  rule  over  this 
Empire?  "  asked  Prince  William  again. 
The  woman  repeated  the  arithmetical 
operation,  taking  the  number  1871  and 
adding  the  same  figures  in  column  .  .  1871 

i 
8 

7 
i 


which  gave  the  result 1888 

Astonished  by  her  confidence,  the  Prince 
then  asked,  "  And  how  long  is  this  fine 
Empire  to  last?"  Then  the  woman,  taking 


92  Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

the  figures   1888  and  repeating  the  same 
operation 1888 

i 
8 
8 
8 

obtained  the  result 1913 

The  story  soon  spread  in  Prussian  Court  circles. 
Prince  William  became  German  Emperor  in  1871 
and  died  in  1888.  The  effect  of  the  double  fulfilment 
of  the  prophecy  upon  the  present  German  Emperor's 
mind  was  great,  and,  as  my  experience  shows,  it 
entered  into  the  calculation  of  Prussian  diplomatists 
as  long  ago  as  1899.  May  we  not  have  here  a 
psychological  clue  to  the  failure  of  the  German 
Emperor  to  use  his  influence  for  peace  during  the 
diplomatic  negotiations  of  last  month? — I  am,  Sir, 
yours,  Vmi. 

Although  the  year  1913  is  undoubtedly  past 
beyond  recall,  the  lovers  of  mystery  are  loth  to 
allow  so  promising  an  example  of  what  they 
call  cabbalistic  divination  to  fizzle  out  like  an 
exploded  squib.  The  year  1913,  they  contend, 
may  still  be  regarded  as  fatal  because  it  was 
the  last  year  of  the  Kaiser's  unchallenged 
supremacy.  It  does  not  seem  to  occur  to  them 
that  by  this  lax  interpretation  they  are  multiply- 
ing the  mathematical  chance  by  three,  for  if  the 
empire  had  been  overthrown  in  1912  the  same 
interpreters  would  undoubtedly  have  urged  that 
the  prophecy  was  verified,  on  the  ground  that 


Variants  of  the  Story  93 

the  year  1913  stood  first  in  the  new  order  of 
things.  In  point  of  fact,  even  as  an  historical 
incident,  the  story  abounds  in  suspicious 
features.  To  begin  with,  it  is  told  in  several 
different  ways.  For  example,  a  French  brochure, 
Predictions  sur  la  Fin  de  I'Allemagne,  which 
is  followed  by  Mr.  W.  M.  Fullerton  in  a  book 
recently  published,  Problems  of  Power,1  refers 
to  it  as  the  "prediction  of  Fiensberg  "  —  Fiens- 
berg  being,  it  seems,  a  village  near  Baden  where 
the  incident  occurred.  According  to  this  version 
a  certain  Countess  R.,  who  was  supposed  to  be 
gifted  with  second  sight,  had  been  asked  by 
William,  then  Prince  of  Prussia,  what  she  could 
tell  him  about  his  future  destiny.  In  answer  the 
Countess  simply  took  him  through  the  little 
series  of  addition  sums  which  has  just  been 
given.  On  the  other  hand,  according  to  Mr. 
F.  L.  Rawson,2  a  Paris  variant  declares  that  the 
prophet  lived  in  England  and  was  a  thought- 
reader  by  profession,  but  as  the  future  Emperor 
visited  England  in  1848,  and  not  in  1849,  the 
amendment  seems  eminently  improbable.  An- 
other account3  states  that  the  Emperor  William  I 
consulted  a  clairvoyante  when  he  was  a  young 
man  as  far  back  as  1829.  She  bade  him  add  up 
the  digits  ( 1 829  +1+8  +  2  +  9=1 849)  and  told  him 

1  Fullerton,  Problems  of  Power  (London,  1913),  p.  282,  note. 

2  F.  L.  Rawson,  How  the   War  will  end  (London,   1914),  p. 
46.     This  writer  also  refers  to  a  version  in   the  Neue  Meta- 
physische  Rundschau,  January,  1912. 

3  See  Light,  February  24th,  1912. 


94  Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

his  life  would  be  attempted  in  1849,  and  the  rest 
as  before.  In  any  case,  we  may  assert  with 
confidence  that  neither  the  gipsy  woman,  nor 
the  Countess  R.,  nor  anyone  else  in  1849,  in- 
vented this  very  innocent  arithmetical  device  for 
guessing  at  the  future.  The  method  is  abun- 
dantly illustrated  in  a  book  published  in  1842, 
called  Amusements  Philologiques,  by  "  G.  P. 
Philomneste,"  of  which  there  were  also  earlier 
editions.  In  this  little  work  the  following 
remarkable  example  is  given,  not  as  connected 
with  any  story  of  successful  divination  but 
simply  as  an  arithmetical  curiosity  : 

Robespierre  fell  and  the  Reign  of  Terror 
ended  in  1794,  adding  the  sum  of  these  digits  to 
the  date  we  get:  1794+1  +  7  +  9  +  4=1815,  which 
is  the  year  of  the  fall  of  Napoleon.  Again 
pursuing  the  same  process  a  stage  further,  we 
obtain  1815  +  1+8+1+5  =  1830,  which  saw  the 
fall  of  Charles  X  and  with  him  of  the  Bourbon 
dynasty.  Thus  : 

1794  1815 

i  i 

7  8 

9  i 

4  5 


1815  1830 

(Battle  of  Waterloo)  (Expulsion  of  the 

Bourbons) 


Napoleon  Ill's  Fatal  Year  95 

Perhaps  almost  the  only  example  which  can 
be  quoted  of  a  prophecy  which  is  extant,  in  black 
and  white,  at  a  date  earlier  than  the  time  of  its 
verification,  is  a  numerical  prognostic  of  the 
same  kind  which  may  be  found  in  Notes  and 
Queries  for  September  i5th,  1866,  p.  215  : 

Louis  Napoleon,  says  the  writer,  was  proclaimed 
Emperor  (see  Hartland's  Tables)  in  January,  1853. 
Add  to  this  year  the  digits  either  of  this  date,  or  of 
his  birth  (in  1808),  or  of  the  birth  of  the  Empress 
Euge'nie  (in  1826),  and  we  get : 

Became 

Emperor     1853  1853  1853 


Empire 


Birth 


8       Bi?h    I       8 
0          of 

8    Empress  \       6 


1870  1870  1870 

And,  indeed,  we  might  join  to  these  converg- 
ing coincidences  the  results  given  by  the  date  of 
Louis  Napoleon's  marriage  with  the  Empress, 
which  also  took  place  in  1853.  But  this  very 
prognostic,  which  looks  so  startling  when  we 
find  it  set  out  in  print  four  years  before  the 
battle  of  Sedan,  i.e.,  before  the  downfall  of  the 
second  Empire,  also  illustrates  in  a  remarkable 
way  how  purely  fortuitous  is  the  significance  of 
the  whole  computation.  In  point  of  fact  Napoleon 
was  not  proclaimed  Emperor  in  January,  1853, 
but  in  December,  1852.  It  is  true,  as  the  writer 
in  Notes  and  Queries  states,  that  the  date 


96  Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

assigned  in  Hartland's  Chronological  Dictionary 
is  January,  1853,  but  this  is  simply  a  blunder. 
A  hundred  different  authorities  could  be  quoted 
to  show  that  the  second  Empire  began  in  the 
preceding  year.  Moreover,  we  have  only  to 
select  our  facts  a  little  differently  and  it  is  easy 
to  prove,  this  time  without  the  aid  of  any 
erroneous  chronology,  that  the  annus  fatalis  for 
Louis  Napoleon  ought  to  have  been  1869,  not 
1870.  The  revolution,  which  ended  in  Napoleon 
being  elected  President  of  the  Republic,  was  in 
1848.  Add  1+8  +  4  +  8  to  1848  and  we  get  1869. 
Again,  he  became  Emperor  in  1852,  he  was  born 
in  1808,  Eugenie  was  born  in  1826,  and  they 
were  married  in  1853.  From  all  these  we  obtain 
the  date  1869,  as  the  following  figures  show  : 


Emperor  1852 

1852 

I 

i 

Born 

8 
o 

Empress 
Born 

8 

2 

0 

. 

6 

Married, 


1852 

i 
8 

5 
3 


1869  1869  1869 

This  agreement  is  curious,  but  not  so  very 
remarkable.  A  really  surprising  coincidence, 
however,  is  revealed  when  we  apply  the  same 
treatment  to  the  case  of  Louis  Philippe,  the 
immediate  predecessor  of  Napoleon  as  ruler  of 
France.  Louis  Philippe  became  king  in  1830; 
he  was  born  in  1773,  his  queen  was  born  in  1782, 
and  he  was  married  in  1809.  Now  this  gives  us  : 


Cabbalistic  Coincidences  97 


Date  of 

Accession:  1830                  1830                    1830 

Date  of 
birth 

*   Date  of 
'    wife's 
birth 

I                                                     I 

7    Date  of  J       8 
8  marriage"]       o 

Q 

2                   1       9 

1848  1848  1848 

Strange  to  say,  1848  was,  in  fact,  the  date  of 
Louis  Philippe's  downfall.  But,  in  spite  of  a 
similar  unanimity  of  the  prognostics,  it  was  in 
1870,  and  not  in  1869,  that  the  overthrow  of 
Napoleon  actually  came  to  pass. 

The  fact  is,  that  when  one  takes  the  trouble  to 
look  into  it,  the  mystery  admits  of  a  very  simple 
explanation.  The  sum  of  the  digits  of  any 
modern  date  must  in  any  case  lie  between  9  and 
27,  most  commonly  between  15  and  25.  Now 
an  interval  of  from  15  to  25  years  is  the  sort  of 
period  in  which  momentous  political  changes 
come  about,  and  if  one  selects  one's  starting- 
point  judiciously  it  is  not  difficult  to  hit  upon 
coincidences.  Take,  for  example,  the  election 
of  Pope  Leo  XIII  in  1878.  Add  these  digits 
together  and  you  have  1878+1+8  +  7  f  8  =1902 
for  the  election  of  his  successor,  and  the  sum  of 
the  digits  of  this  last  date  (1902+1+9  +  2  =  1914) 
would  prepare  us  for  the  coming  of  another  new 
Pope  in  1914.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Pope  Leo 
XIII  was  inconsiderate  enough  to  upset  our 
calculation  by  dying  in  1903  instead  of  in  1902, 
but  the  forecast  might  have  been  claimed  by  any 


98  Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

aspirant  to  seership  as  a  very  near  thing,  and  he 
might  plead  in  extenuation  of  this  slight  mis- 
carriage of  his  previsions,  that  in  any  case  Pope 
Pius  X  must  have  been  fated  to  die  in  1914 
because  the  most  conspicuous  epoch  in  his  career 
was  1893,  in  which  year  he  was  both  created 
Cardinal  and  named  Patriarch  of  Venice,  and 
1893+1+8  +  9+3  =  1914,  the  year  of  his  death. 
It  was  suggested  above  that  to  secure  success- 
ful divination  upon  these  lines  it  is  essential  to 
choose  one's  starting  point  judiciously.  For 
example,  any  embryo  Zadkiel  who  chanced  to 
notice  that  the  date  of  the  accession  of  the  un- 
fortunate Louis  XVI,  i.e.,  1774,  contained  a 
premonition  of  the  time  of  his  execution  upon 
the  scaffold  (1774+ i +  7  +  7  +  4=1793)  would  be 
careful  not  to  proclaim  this  fact  baldly  in  such 
a  way  that  it  seemed  a  mere  isolated  coincidence. 
He  would  probably  invent  a  picturesque  setting 
for  his  prognostic  and  develop  it  as  far  as 
possible ;  something,  for  example,  in  this  style. 

It  was  the  year  1760,  at  the  crisis  of  the 
struggle  between  the  Encyclope'distes  and  the 
Jesuits.  The  Encyclopedistes  stood  for  the  new 
godless  philosophy  of  Voltaire,  and  the  Jesuits, 
so  soon  to  be  expelled  from  France,  represented 
clericalism  and  the  ancien  regime.  To  an  aged 
Jesuit,  filled  with  sadness  at  the  political  out- 
look, there  came  the  gouvernante  of  the  little 
Prince  Louis,  son  of  the  Dauphin  and  grandson 


King  Louis  XVI  99 

of  the  King.  She  asked  the  good  priest  why 
he  seemed  so  sad,  what  misfortune  threatened. 

"I  have  been  studying,"  he  replied,  "the 
cabbalistic  properties  of  numbers,  and  what  I 
see  fills  me  with  alarm.  Add  up  the  digits  of  the 
present  year,  1760.  One  and  seven  and  six  and 
nought." 

"That  makes  14,  Father." 

"  Well,  in  14  years'  time,  that  is  in  1774,  this 
little  prince,  still  a  mere  boy,  will  be  called  upon 
to  govern  France.  But  further  add  up  for  me 
the  digits  of  1774." 

"  The  sum,  Reverend  Father,  is  19." 

"  And  if  you  add  19  to  1774  what  do  you  get 
then?" 

"  It  gives  us  1793." 

"Then  I  would  have  you  know  that  in  1793 
this  poor  boy  will  perish  by  a  most  terrible 
death,  and  that  with  him  will  fall  the  whole 
political  order  which  he  represents." 

"Is  that  the  end?" 

"No;  sum  up  yet  again  the  digits  of  1793, 
and  add  this  also  to  the  year  itself." 

"That,  Father,  will  bring  us  to  1813." 

"  Well,  in  1813  a  battle  will  be  fought  which 
will  place  France  at  the  mercy  of  the  other 
nations  of  Europe.  The  empire  founded  by  a 
tyrant  on  the  ruins  of  our  kingship  will  then,  in 
its  turn,  be  overthrown." 

Of  course  it  would  have  been  more  effective  if 


ioo         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

we  could  have  come  out  at  the  year  1815,  the 
Battle  of  Waterloo ;  but  the  Battle  of  Leipzig  in 
1813  does  very  well,  and  it  was  really  the  end  of 
the  Napoleonic  usurpation.  This,  in  any  case, 
is  a  more  impressive  presentment  of  the  facts 
than  the  statement  of  a  single  coincidence,  and 
it  is  all  due  to  the  prudent  selection  of  1760  as 
a  starting-point.  You  take  1760  because  the 
digits  happen  to  bring  you  to  the  1774,  which 
you  want,  and  no  other  year  would  serve.  The 
same  principle,  if  I  mistake  not,  has  guided  the 
choice  of  the  year  1849  for  the  starting-point  of 
the  Kaiser  Wilhelm  prognostic.  Nothing 
momentous  happened  to  the  Prince  of  Prussia 
in  1849.  He  did  not  come  to  the  throne  in  that 
year,  or  attain  any  new  dignity,  but  the  sum  of 
the  digits  of  1849,  when  added  to  the  date  itself, 
happens  to  yield  1871;  1871,  similarly  treated, 
conducts  you  to  1888,  which  is  really  the  only 
coincidence  in  the  series;  1888,  with  its  digits 
added,  comes  very  near  to  landing  us  in  the 
great  European  cataclysm  now  going  on  around 
us,  but,  as  usual,  spoils  the  sequence  by  being 
just  a  year  or  two  out,  in  this  case  a  year  or  two 
too  early. 

It  may  be  worth  while  to  add  that  some  arith- 
metical prognostic  of  the  kind  here  discussed 
seems  to  have  been  current  in  Germany  as  early 
as  1882,  that  is  to  say,  six  years  before  the  death 
of  Kaiser  Wilhelm  I.  But  Miss  Max  Wall's 
letter  on  the  subject  to  Light  (August  22nd, 


An  Arithmetical  Prognostic        101 

1914)  does  not  leave  a  very  clear  impression  of 
the  nature  of  the  prophecy  which  was  then  in 
circulation.  In  any  case  no  one  has  so  far 
produced  any  reliable  evidence  to  show  that  the 
prediction  had  been  heard  of  before  the  period  of 
the  Franco-Prussian  War. 

It  is  plain  then  that  no  reliance  can  be  placed 
on  this  method  of  arithmetical  divination.  The 
instances  in  which  it  seems  occasionally  to  be 
verified  are  mere  coincidences.  Neither  can  such 
coincidences  be  regarded  as  at  all  extraordinary, 
seeing  that  the  mathematical  chance  against  their 
occurrence  cannot  ordinarily  be  rated  higher 
than  at  about  20  to  i.  Moreover,  it  will  hardly 
be  disputed  that  the  whole  process  is  puerile  and 
arbitrary  in  the  highest  degree.  Perhaps  this 
last  aspect  of  the  matter  may  best  be  emphasized 
by  a  sort  of  reductio  ad  absurdum.  Here  is  an 
arithmetical  computation  made  in  one  of  those 
prophecy  books  previously  spoken  of,  in  which 
pious  Legitimists,  after  the  close  of  the  Franco- 
Prussian  war,  sought  confirmation  for  the  belief 
they  professed  in  the  speedy  triumph  of  Henri 
Vand  Pius  IX.  Could  anything  be  more  pathetic 
than  the  state  of  mind  which  finds  comfort  in 
such  reasoning  as  the  following  ?  : 

The  Venerable  Anna  Maria  Taigi  predicted  that 
Pius  IX  would  reign  twenty-seven  years  and  about 
six  months,  and  that  he  would  consequenetly  die  in 
the  28th  year  of  his  pontificate. 

A  very  curious  cabbalistic  calculation  leads  us  to 
H 


1 02         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

the  same  result.  Take  first  the  signature  of  the 
Holy  Father  Pius  Papa  nonus  (Pius  IX  Pope),  and 
secondly  his  motto  in  the  prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 
Crux  de  Cruce.  Make  a  Latin  alphabet  (since  the 
words  which  we  are  now  concerned  with  are  Latin 
words)  and  number  it.  There  are  23  letters,  as  you 
know,  since  i  and  ;  only  count  as  one  letter,  and 
similarly  u  and  v,  and  there  is  no  w.  Then  a  counts 
i,  b  2,  c  3,  and  so  on  until  we  get  to  2  =  23.  Then 
make  your  first  trial ;  take  the  signature.  Pius  gives 
you  62  ;  Papa  32 ;  nonus  78.  Add  these  cabbalistic- 
ally  and  you  have  6  +  2  +  3  +  2+7  +  8  =  28.  Treat  the 
motto  in  the  same  way.  Crux  gives  61  ;  de  9 ;  cruce 
48.  Once  more  add  these  together  cabbalistically  and 
you  have  6+1+9  +  4+8  =  28.  A  Jewish  cabbalist 
would  at  once  draw  the  inference  that  Pius  Papa 
nonus  is  identical  with  the  personage  designated  by 
Crux  de  Cruce,  since  they  both  yield  the  same 
number.1 

The  worthy  Abbe"  Chabauty,  who  is  the  author 
of  this  marvellous  rigmarole,  proceeds  to  push 
his  conclusions  even  further;  but  we  will  be 
content  to  note  that  after  these  developments  he 

1  Lettres  sur  les  proph£ties  modernes  et  Concordance  de 
toutes  les  Predictions  (Paris,  1872),  p.  155. 

This  device  of  attaching  a  numerical  value  to  the  letters  of 
our  alphabet  is  not  entirely  unknown  in  England.  Let  me  quote 
the  following  illustration  from  The  Principles  of  Science  of 
W.  S.  Jevons,  3rd  ed.,  p.  263.  He  gives  it  as  an  example  of  a 
curious  coincidence  : 

"  The  French  Chamber  of  Deputies  in  1830  consisted  of  402 
members,  of  whom  221  formed  the  party  called  '  La  queue  de 
Robespierre,'  while  the  remainder,  181  in  number,  were  named 
'  Les  honnetes  gens.'  If  we  give  to  each  letter  a  numerical 
value  corresponding  to  its  place  in  the  alphabet  it  will  be  found 
that  the  sum  of  the  values  of  the  letters  in  each  name  exactly 
indicates  the  number  of  the  party." 


Anna  Maria  Taigi  again          103 

comes  back  with  much  satisfaction  to  the  main 
point,  viz.,  that  the  pontificate  of  twenty-eight 
years  thus  assigned  to  Pius  X  is  not  only  in 
exact  accord  with  the  prophecy  of  Anna  Maria 
Taigi,  but  also  with  the  "  three  years  and  a 
little  longer  "  assigned  by  Marie  Lataste  for  the 
desolation  of  Rome.  In  August,  1870,  Rome 
was  left  defenceless  when  Napoleon  withdrew 
the  French  troops  from  the  city.  The  three  years 
would  be  up  in  August,  1873,  the  Pope,  accord- 
ing to  Anna  Maria  Taigi's  prophecy  of  a  ponti- 
ficate of  27^  years,  would  die  about  the  middle 
of  December,  1873,  and  consequently  between 
September,  1873,  and  the  December  of  the  same 
year,  Catholics  would  see  the  patrimony  of  the 
Holy  See  restored.  The  complete  triumph  of 
the  Church,  however,  would  only  come  when, 
after  the  death  of  Pius  IX,  the  victorious  monarch 
of  France,  Henri  V,  should  instal  the  Pope's 
successor  upon  the  chair  of  St.  Peter  with  every 
circumstance  of  pomp  and  splendour. 

So  M.  Abbe*  Chabauty  dreamed  in  1871.  I  do 
not  know  how  many  editions  his  book  went 
through.  The  copy  I  have  before  me  is  of  the 
second  edition,  issued  by  a  first  rate  firm  of 
religious  publishers  in  Paris  in  1872.*  Such 
speculations  do  not  call  for  much  discussion 
when  we  look  back  upon  them  forty  years  after- 

1  The  book  indeed  bears  the  imprint  both  of  Henri  Oudin  of 
Poitiers  and  Victor  Palm6  of  Paris.  The  latter  firm  issued  the 
reprint  of  the  Bollandist  Acta  Sanctorum  in  60  vols.  folio,  as 
well  as  numberless  other  important  works. 


104  Diviners  and  Soothsayers 
wards.  It  is  sufficient  to  remind  the  reader  that 
Pope  Pius  IX  died  not  in  1873  but  in  1878,  still 
virtually  a  prisoner,  that  to  this  day  the  temporal 
authority  of  the  Holy  See  does  not  extend 
beyond  the  precincts  of  the  Vatican,  and  that  the 
Comte  de  Chambord  (Henri  V)  ended  in  1883 
a  life  which  had  almost  entirely  been  spent  in 
exile  from  his  native  land. 

Quite  apart  from  any  pretence  of  the  quasi- 
scientific  manipulation  of  numbers  there  exists 
at  all  times  a  literature  of  divination,  the  extent 
of  which  is  realized  by  few  who  have  not  per- 
sonally made  acquaintance  with  it.  For  the  one 
or  two  publications  like  Old  Moore's  Almanack 
and  Zadkiel's  Almanack,  of  which  the  names  are 
familiar  to  the  general  reader,  there  are  scores  of 
others  in  every  European  language  which  equally 
profess  to  unveil  the  future  and  which  are  in- 
variably more  or  less  identified  with  the  jargon 
of  astrology  and  horoscopy.  Beyond  a  few 
passing  words  I  have  no  intention  of  attempting 
to  deal  with  the  subject  here,  but  it  seems  worth 
while  to  point  out,  however  briefly,  that  the  true 
cause  of  the  favour  shown  to  these  bogus  pro- 
phecies lies  in  the  disposition  of  the  uncritical 
mind  to  count  only  the  successes  and  persistently 
to  ignore  the  failures.  As  Bacon  says  in  his 
essay  on  the  subject,  "  Men  marke  when  they 
hit,  and  never  marke  when  they  misse."  The 
tendency  is  by  no  means  confined  to  persons  of 
a  conspicuously  religious  temperament.  Quite 


Zadkiel  105 

recently  the  strong  impression  made  upon  an 
acquaintance  of  a  very  opposite  habit  of  mind — 
the  incarnation,  I  should  have  judged  of  robust 
scepticism — by  the  vaticinations  of  the  celebrated 
Mr.  Zadkiel  concerning  the  present  war,  induced 
me  to  make  an  investigation  both  of  this  and  of 
some  copies  of  the  Almanack  published  under 
the  name  of  "  Old  Moore."  The  inquiry,  I 
confess,  when  not  confined  to  one  issue  but 
extending  over  several  years,  proved  distinctly 
interesting  as  a  revelation  of  the  methods 
followed  by  the  compilers  of  this  class  of  pub- 
lications. But  let  me  quote  first  the  prognostics 
which  had  excited  the  alarm  of  my  usually 
incredulous  friend.  In  connection  with  the  total 
eclipse  of  the  sun  which  took  place  on  August 
2 ist,  1914,  Zadkiel  nine  months  before  had 
remarked  : 

Junctinus  averred  that  a  great  eclipse  of  the  sun 
in  Leo  "  presignifies  the  motion  of  armies,  death  of 
a  king,  danger  of  war,  and  scarcity  of  rain."  In 
countries  and  cities  ruled  by  the  sign  Leo  such  events 
would  be  most  likely  to  take  place — in  France,  Italy, 
Sicily,  Roumania,  Rome,  etc.  As  the  eclipse  falls 
in  opposition  to  the  place  of  the  moon  at  the  birth  of 
the  King  of  Italy,  his  Majesty  should  as  far  as 
possible  avoid  war  and  safeguard  his  health  this  year 
and  for  the  next  two  years. 

It  is  singular  that  this  great  eclipse  falls  in  the 
exact  place  of  Mars  in  the  summer  solstice.  The 
rulers  of  Prussia  and  Austria  should  accept  the 
warning  also. 


io6         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

Taken  thus  far,  the  seer's  forecast  might  easily 
impress  the  casual  reader  as  evincing  a  somewhat 
uncanny  insight  into  future  events.  But  it  goes 
on  : 

At  St.  Petersburg  Mars  is  only  two  degrees  past 
the  mid-heaven,  and  Venus  is  in  the  tenth  house,  so 
that  the  influences  are  well  balanced  as  to  peace  and 
strife,  and  accordingly  there  is  ground  for  hope  that 
Europe  will  be  spared  a  great  war  and  that  the  great 
nations,  if  not  all,  will  be  enabled  to  pursue  their 
peaceful  occupations. 

Here  we  have,  of  course,  an  obvious  inclina- 
tion to  hedge,  but  even  with  this  qualification  it 
is  quite  intelligible  that  anyone  who  did  not 
know  Mr.  Zadkiel  and  his  ways  should  credit 
him  with  a  rather  remarkable  hit.  It  is  only 
when  we  come  to  look  at  the  previous  issues, 
and  note  that  the  complications  of  the  Eastern 
question  and  the  growing  armaments  of  Ger- 
many have  induced  our  astrologers  to  persist 
year  after  year  in  prophesying  war  that  we 
appreciate  how  little  it  all  amounts  to.  Thus 
for  the  politically  peaceful  autumn  of  1911 
Zadkiel  issued  the  warning  : 

Mars  flames  fiercely  close  to  the  mid-heaven. 
This  should  be  a  serious  warning  to  our  Government 
to  strengthen  army  and  navy  and  to  keep  a  sharp 
eye  on  the  North  Sea  and  the  East  of  Europe  and 
Egypt.  The  ancient  aphorism  relating  to  such  a 
configuration  indicates  "  quarrels,  discords,  and 
bloodshed."  Should  peace  in  Europe  and  Asia  be 
happily  secured,  then  there  is  a  risk  that  political 


War  in  1 9 1 2  !  1 07 

strife  will  culminate  in  discords,  strikes,  and  serious 
riots  in  England,  Wales,  and  Ireland. 

This  was  no  doubt  the  autumn  of  the  railway 
strike,  but  disturbances  thus  vaguely  indicated 
and  safeguarded  are  a  very  safe  card  to  play. 
For  the  spring  of  1912  (which,  except  for  the 
Italo-Turkish  War,  begun  in  the  previous  Sep- 
tember, passed  away  peacefully  and  unevent- 
fully), we  have  the  following  startling  announce- 
ment in  capitals  : 

As  the  central  line  of  the  solar  eclipse  passes,  etc. 
.  .  .  the  danger  of  WAR  IN  EUROPE  is  imminent, 
and  it  is  our  duty  to  warn  the  rulers  of  European 
countries  of  this  danger.  ...  It  is  imperative  that 
England  should  strengthen  army  and  navy  and  pre- 
pare to  meet  sudden  attack  by  a  formidable  combina- 
tion on  her  great  empire. 

In  May,  1912,  we  have  this  caution  from  the 
same  source : 

A  most  critical  time  is  at  hand  in  the  United 
Kingdom,  in  Europe,  and  in  the  United  States,  and 
it  will  be  a  matter  for  great  thankfulness  if  blood- 
shed and  warfare  can  be  avoided  and  if  the  breakers 
of  solemn  treaties  and  the  instigators  of  piratical 
warfare  can  be  compelled  to  keep  the  peace.  .  .  . 
The  loth  and  2ist  and  the  last  few  days  seem  to  be 
the  most  critical  for  the  civilized  world,  especially 
for  Russia,  Prussia,  and  France. 

This  might  have  served  very  well  for  a  forecast 
of  August,  1914,  but  it  had  not  a  shadow  of 
justification  in  May,  1912.  It  would  be  absurd 
to  multiply  further  illustrations.  Let  me  only 


io8        Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

notice  that  for  the  same  year,  1914,  side  by  side 
with  the  relatively  well-founded  caution  against 
war,  we  have  such  wild  shots  as  the  following  : 

August,  1914.  Our  relations  with  Russia  appear 
to  be  strained.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  threatened 
rupture  may  be  averted.  .  .  .  Towards  the  close  of 
the  month  there  may  again  be  trouble  in  Bengal.  In 
and  around  Delhi  the  Viceroy  should  be  well 
guarded. 

Or,  again  : 

September,  1914.  About  the  7th  of  the  month 
there  are  indications  of  female  influence  being 
adverse  to  Parliamentary  proceedings,  and  it  is 
possible  that  the  suffragists  will  become  obstreperous. 

Similarly  in  1913  Zadkiel  announced  : 
This  seems  to  presignify  that  the  Liberal  Govern- 
ment will  become  very  unpopular  and  meet  with  a 
speedy  overthrow. 

There  can  be  little  doubt — and  a  comparison 
of  the  issues  for  successive  years  strongly  deepens 
the  impression — that  the  prophetic  utterances  of 
Zadkiel  and  Old  Moore  are  carefully  calculated, 
in  accordance  with  what  seems  to  be  the  balance 
of  probabilities,  to  score  as  many  hits  as  possible. 
An  immense  number  of  shots  are  made — that 
many  of  them  are  mutually  inconsistent  matters 
little — and  it  is  hoped  that  a  fair  proportion  of 
these  will  go  near  enough  to  the  mark  to  be 
claimed  as  successes.  This  multiplication  of 
predictions  is  in  many  of  these  books  reduced  to 
a  system  by  making  the  prognostics  three  times 


Judicious  Hedging  109 

over — first  in  the  calendar  itself,  then  in  a 
general  summary  of  the  prophetic  outlook,  and 
lastly  by  separately  calculating  the  horoscope  of 
all  prominent  political  personages.  In  each  of 
these  divisions  new  forecasts  are  introduced  and 
they  are  often  quite  divergent  from  each  other  in 
tone,  sometimes  absolutely  irreconcilable.  On 
the  other  hand,  nearly  all  statements  are  quali- 
fied and  safeguarded.  We  are  not  told  positively 
that  a  war  will  take  place,  but  that  peace  is 
seriously  menaced ;  we  are  not  informed  that  the 
Emperor  of  Austria,  for  example,  will  die,  but 
that  he  ought  to  take  care  of  his  health.  If  any 
calamity  of  the  kind  hinted  at  actually  occurs  the 
prophet  claims  a  success  and  duly  advertises  it 
in  next  year's  issue.  If  nothing  happens  the 
catastrophe  is  supposed  to  have  been  providen- 
tially averted  and  the  prediction  attracts  no 
further  attention — at  any  rate,  it  is  not  counted 
as  a  failure.  Even  when  successes  are  proclaimed 
with  an  immense  flourish  of  trumpets  those 
readers  who  will  take  the  trouble  to  compare  the 
events  as  they  actually  occur  with  the  wording 
of  the  forecast  will  almost  invariably  find  that 
the  data  calculated  to  mislead  are  far  in  excess 
of  the  details  that  are  verified.  For  example,  in 
the  Antares  Almanac  for  1913  an  announcement 
was  made  concerning  the  Kaiser,  which  has 
been  much  quoted  as  a  most  wonderful  example 
of  astrological  divination.  The  whole  passage 
runs  as  follows  : 


1 1  o         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

THE    GERMAN    EMPEROR    WILLIAM    II. 

The  Kaiser's  star  courses  in  1913  and  1914  are 
brooding.  They  are  a  menace  both  to  his  health  and 
fortunes,  but  chiefly  to  his  fortunes.  Such  aspects 
as  these  will,  we  fear,  impel  him  to  declare  war 
either  against  England  or  France  in  1913  or  1914, 
and  these  aspects  threaten  him  with  heavy  money 
loss.  Disaster,  therefore,  will  attend  his  military 
operations.  Verily,  the  stars  will  be  fighting  against 
the  German  Emperor  as  they  fought  against  Sisera 
of  old,  but  it  is  especially  on  the  sea  that  disaster  will 
overtake  him.  We  have  no  hesitation  in  predicting 
the  destruction  of  the  whole  of  the  German  fleet  if, 
as  we  expect,  Germany  engages  herself  in  war  with 
England;  for  our  King's  star  courses  are  propitious 
and  indicate  success,  whilst  the  Kaiser's  indicate 
unmitigated  disaster.  We  regard  1913  and  1914  as 
the  most  critical  and  perilous  years  of  the  Kaiser's 
life,  both  for  his  health  and  fortunes.  They  are 
years  not  only  of  aggressive  fortune,  but  of  the 
malice  of  fortune. 

Now  to  begin  with,  the  prophet,  we  notice, 
gives  himself  a  margin  of  two  years.  This  seems 
to  me  a  generous  allowance,  when,  after  all,  in 
predicting  war,  he  was  only  echoing  the  confident 
anticipations  of  two-thirds  of  our  journalists. 
Then  he  certainly  implies  that  by  the  end  of 
1914  catastrophe  will  have  overtaken  the  Kaiser, 
that  his  fleet  will  have  been  annihilated,  or  that, 
in  any  case,  disaster  at  sea  will  be  the  outstand- 
ing feature  of  any  hostilities  which  are  set  on 
foot.  Nothing  is  said  of  the  conquest  of 


Dubious  Successes  1 1 1 

Belgium,  of  the  occupation  of  a  considerable 
slice  of  French  territory,  of  a  campaign  success- 
fully maintained  against  the  numerical  prepon- 
derance of  Russia.  It  is  true  that  the  final  issue 
has  not  yet  been  reached.  Overthrow  and 
financial  ruin  may  still  be  the  ultimate  fate  of 
the  aggressor,  but  any  rash  believer  who  allowed 
himself  to  be  guided  in,  let  us  say,  his  com- 
mercial speculations,  by  this  exceptionally 
"  successful  "  forecast  of  the  Antares  seer,  would 
almost  certainly  have  laid  up  for  himself  a  time 
of  bitter  disappointment,  if  not  of  irretrievable 
disaster.  And  if  this  is  the  case  with  the  suc- 
cesses, what  is  to  be  said  of  the  failures  ? 

I  am  not  now  expressing  any  opinion  as  to 
the  abstract  possibility  of  foretelling  the  future. 
One  Hears  wonderful  stories  of  the  predictions 
made  by  palmists  and  others.  It  would  not  be 
scientific  to  assert  a  priori  that  all  these  stories 
must  be  untrue.  Even  though  we  can  give  no 
rational  explanation  of  the  phenomena  of  second 
sight,  it  would  be  rash  to  declare  it  to  be  a  myth. 
But  so  far  as  I  have  had  any  opportunity  of 
testing  such  accounts,  I  have  never  yet  met  with 
a  satisfactory  example  of  an  event  of  public 
interest  which  had  been  clearly  foretold  by  any 
palmist  or  clairvoyante.  There  are  always  flaws, 
and  generally  serious  flaws,  in  the  evidence  by 
which  such  stories  of  successful  divination  are 
substantiated.  Whenever  a  great  crisis — say, 
for  example,  an  Arctic  expedition — is  expected, 


112         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

there  are  a  thousand  reasons  why  any  soothsayer 
who  is  conscious  of  possessing  the  power  to 
foresee  the  result  should  exercise  that  gift.  There 
are  equally  a  thousand  reasons  which  would 
prompt  him  or  her  to  have  the  prediction  put  on 
record,  in  the  clearest  terms  and  with  the 
strictest  formalities,  while  yet  that  result  is  un- 
known. But  though  there  are  innumerable 
prophecies  made  and  even  printed,  it  is  still 
possible  for  serious  students  of  psychic  pheno- 
mena to  debate  whether  all  history  can  show  a 
single  reliable  instance  of  the  prevision  of  an 
unguessable  future  event,  especially,  as  said 
above,  an  event  of  public  interest. 

The  palmist  "  Madame  de  Thebes  "  has  the 
reputation  of  having  foretold  the  terrible  con- 
flagration at  the  "  Bazar  de  la  Charite"  "  in  which 
the  Duchesse  d'Alen9on  and  so  many  other 
great  ladies  lost  their  lives.  Unfortunately  no 
adequate  evidence  establishes  the  genuineness 
of  the  prediction.  If  the  claim  were  indisputable, 
it  would  be  greatly  to  the  pecuniary  interest  of 
Mme.  de  Thebes  to  put  the  evidence  for  the 
prophecy  permanently  on  record.  Most  of  our 
palmists  and  diviners  do  not  disdain  to  receive 
money  for  the  exercise  of  their  peculiar  faculty.1 

1  I  am  not  in  the  least  disputing  the  power  possessed  by  many 
persons  of  unveiling  the  past  secret  history  and  present  diffi- 
culties of  those  (often  complete  strangers)  who  come  to  consult 
them.  Of  that  gift  more  than  one  explanation  may  be  offered. 
But  the  question  now  before  us  concerns  only  the  knowledge  of 
the  future. 


Madame  de  Thebes  1 1  3 

It  is  curious  that  they  should  be  content  to 
receive  guineas  and  half-guineas  for  regulating 
the  love  affairs  of  quite  obscure  people,  when  an 
assured  knowledge  of  the  approach  of  war,  the 
spread  of  revolution,  and  the  death  of  monarchs 
and  statesmen,  would  make  such  gifted  persons 
the  very  kings  of  the  Stock  Exchange  if  they 
directed  their  energies  to  a  more  remunerative 
field  of  industry.  What  financier  was  it  who 
said  that  he  did  not  ask  to  know  the  future 
twelve  months  ahead,  but  that  if  any  lady  could 
always  tell  him  what  was  going  to  happen  the 
day  after  to-morrow  he  would  be  delighted  to 
offer  her  a  retaining  fee  of  fifty  thousand  a  year 
for  her  exclusive  services? 

Consequently  when  the  same  Mme.  de  Th&bes 
chimes  in  with  the  Antares  prophet  and  tells  us 
with  much  eloquence  and  entrain  all  kinds  of 
gruesome  things  about  the  Kaiser's  horoscope, 
I  confess  she  leaves  me  unmoved.  Here  is  a 
specimen  culled  from  the  Almanack  de  Mme.  de 
Thebes  for  1913  : 

Germany  menaces  Europe  in  general  and  France 
in  particular.  When  the  war  breaks  out  she  will 
have  willed  it,  but  after  it  there  will  be  no  longer 
Hohenzollern  or  Prussian  domination.  I  have  said, 
and  I  repeat,  that  the  days  of  the  Emperor  are 
numbered,  and  after  him  all  will  be  changed  in 
Germany — I  say  his  days  of  reign,  I  do  not  say  his 
days  of  life. 

In  the  Almanac  for  1914  she  continues  in  the 


1 14         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

same  strain,  but  it  would  serve  no  good  purpose 
to  quote  further. 

I  do  not  deny  that  curious  coincidences 
occasionally  take  place.  Even  when  we  have 
eliminated  the  mystifications  caused  by  the  sup- 
plementary matter  imported  at  a  much  later  date 
into  the  original  Centuries  of  Nostradamus,  it 
must  seem  a  rather  astonishing  fact  that  two  of 
the  most  tragic  incidents  of  the  history  of 
England  in  the  seventeenth  century  should  have 
been  announced  in  Paris  nearly  a  hundred  years 
before  they  happened.1  Whatever  the  obscurities 
of  the  context,  obscurities  that  are  met  with  in 
every  quatrain  attributed  to  Nostradamus,  the 
words  Senat  de  Londres  mettront  &  mort  leur 
Roi  can  admit  of  but  one  interpretation.  But  it 
may  be  interesting  to  quote  the  whole  quatrain, 
together  with  an  early  English  translation  : 

Gand  et  Bruceles  marcheront  contre  Anvers, 
Senat  de  Londres  mettront  £  mort  leur  Roi ; 
Le  sel  et  vin  luy  seront  a  1'envers 
Pour  eux  avoir  le  regne  en  desarroy. 

— (Cent.  IX,  49.) 

Brussels  and  Ghent  'gainst  Antwerp  forces  bring, 
And  London's  Senate  put  to  death  their  King; 

1  Klinckowstroem  in  his  essay  Die  dltesten  Ausgaben  der 
Prophtties  des  Nostradamus  has  carefully  examined  into  the 
dates  and  contents  of  the  early  editions.  It  is  sufficient  for  my 
present  purpose  to  note  that  all  the  prophecies  of  special  interest 
to  English  readers  are  to  be  found  in  print  in  editions  earlier 
than  1605.  Most  of  them  are  much  older,  for  Michel  Nostra- 
damus himself  died  in  1566. 


Nostradamus  1 1 5 

The  Salt  and  Wine  not  able  to  prevent 
That  warlike  Kingdom's  universal  rent. 

Here,  also,  is  the  quatrain  which  is  supposed  to 
predict  the  Fire  of  London,  with  its  date,  1666  : 

Le  sang  du  juste  &  Londres  fera  faute 
Bruslez  par  foudres  de  vingt  trois  les  six ; 
La  dame  antique  cherra  de  place  haute, 
De  mesme  secte  plusieurs  seront  occis. 

-(Cent.  II,  51.) 

The  blood  o'  the  just  London  rues  full  sore 
When  to  thrice  twenty,  you  shall  add  six  more, 
The  ancient  Dame  shall  fall  from  her  high  place, 
And  the  like  mischief  others  shall  deface. 

Whether  Ghent  and  Brussels  can  in  any  sense 
be  said  to  have  marched  to  Antwerp  towards  the 
close  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  whether  "  salt 
and  wine  "  can  stand  for  France  or  have  any 
intelligible  meaning  at  all,  whether  de  vingt 
trois  les  six  can  represent  1666,  whether  la  dame 
antique  is  to  be  identified  with  St.  Paul's  Cathe- 
dral, and  so  forth,  are  questions  which  cannot  be 
discussed  here.  In  any  case,  it  is  probably 
sufficient  to  say  that  no  clever  charlatan  who 
chooses  to  throw  all  order  and  consistency  to  the 
winds,  and  who  sketches  in  cryptic  language  an 
infinity  of  possible  future  occurrences,  can  fail 
to  score  some  hits  in  the  course  of  more  than 
three  centuries.  The  brilliant  epigram,  whether 
it  was  Beza's  or  another's,  which  represents 
Nostradamus  as  the  prince  of  humbugs,  pro- 


1 1 6         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

bably  comes  nearer  to  the  truth  than  anything 
that  was  ever  said  of  him  by  his  admirers  : 

Nostra  damus  cum  falsa  damus  nam  f allere  nostrum 
est, 

Et  cum  falsa  damus,  nil  nisi  nostra  damus.1 

As  for  the  other  more  famous  predictions  of 
public  occurrences,  they  have  for  the  most  part 
been  deliberate  fabrications  concocted  after  the 
event.  Such,  for  example,  is  the  well-known 
prophetic  vision  of  the  horrors  of  the  French 
Revolution,  attributed  to  Cazotte,  the  author  of 
Le  Diable  amoureux.  No  one  now  seriously 
doubts  that  the  whole  was  a  hoax  or  jeu  d' esprit 
of  which  La  Harpe  was  the  true  author.  On 
the  other  hand,  Dollinger  is  satisfied  of  the  truth 
of  the  statement  that,  thirteen  years  before  the 
outbreak  of  the  Revolution,  a  celebrated 
preacher,  Beauregard,  declared  from  the  pulpit 
of  Notre  Dame  : 

The  temples  of  God  will  be  plundered  and  destroyed, 
His  festivals  abolished,  His  name  blasphemed,  His 
service  proscribed.  Yea,  what  hear  I?  What  see  I? 
In  place  of  hymns  in  praise  of  God,  loud  and  pro- 
fane songs  will  be  sung  here,  and  the  heathen 
goddess  Venus  herself  will  dare  here  to  take  the 
place  of  the  living  God,  to  set  herself  on  the  altar 
and  to  reeive  the  homage  of  her  true  worshippers.3 

1  The   epigram,    which    turns    on    a   pun,    for    Nostradamus 
means  in  Latin  "  we  give  our  own,"  is  quite  untranslatable. 
It  means  literally  "  we  give  our  own  when  we  give  you  lies, 
for  lying  is  our  trade ;  and  when  we  give  you  lies  we  give  you 
nothing  but  our  own." 

2  Dollinger,  Prophecies  and  the  Prophetic  Spirit,  p.   16. 


Mother  Shipton  1 17 

But  this  Dollinger  justly  considers  not  to 
exceed  the  limits  of  natural  prevision  in  a  man 
thoroughly  well  acquainted  with  the  moral 
corruption  and  blasphemous  spirit  of  the  times. 

Of  faked  modern  predictions  an  example  of  a 
quite  different  purport  may  be  quoted  from  a 
booklet  which  a  few  years  ago  professed  to 
record  the  prophecies  of  "  Mother  Shipton." 
Mother  Shipton  herself,  according  to  Sir  Sidney 
Lee,1  is  probably  a  mythical  personage,  but  she 
is  supposed  to  have  foretold  all  kinds  of  historical 
events,  and  amongst  other  things  that  Cardinal 
Wolsey,  though  Archbishop  of  York,  should 
never  visit  his  cathedral  city.  She  was  also  said 
to  have  predicted  the  Civil  Wars  and  the  Fire  of 
London.  But  a  volume  printed  in  1872  went 
still  further  and  attributed  to  her  the  following  : 

ANCIENT   PREDICTION. 

Entitled    by    popular    tradition    "  Mother   Shipton's 
Prophecy  " ;  published  in  1448,  republished  in  1641. 

Carriages  without  horses  shall  go, 
And  accidents  fill  the  world  with  woe. 
Around  the  world  thoughts  shall  fly, 
In  the  twinkling  of  an  eye. 
The  world  upside  down  shall  be, 
And  gold  be  found  at  the  root  of  tree. 
Through  hills  man  shall  ride 
And  no  harm  be  at  his  side. 
Under  water  men  shall  walk, 
Shall  ride,  shall  sleep,  shall  talk. 
1  Diet,  of  Nat.  Biogr.,  s.v. 
I 


1 1 8         Diviners  and  Soothsayers 

In  the  air  men  shall  be  seen, 

In  white,  in  black,  in  green. 

Iron  in  the  water  shall  float 

As  easily  as  a  wooden  boat. 

Gold  shall  be  found  and  shown 

In  a  land  that's  now  not  known. 

Fire  and  water  shall  wonders  do 

England  at  last  shall  admit  a  foe. 

The  world  to  an  end  shall  come 

In  eighteen  hundred  and  eighty-one.1 

As  the  language  alone  would  suffice  to  show,  the 
whole  was  a  modern  fake,  and  a  Mr.  Charles 
Hindley  subsequently  admitted  that  he  had  fabri- 
cated it. 

I  will  conclude  with  a  reference  to  the  one 
single  instance  I  have  ever  come  across  in  which 
an  event  which  could  be  called  an  event  of  public 
interest  seems  to  have  been  really  foretold  before 
it  came  to  pass.  It  is  quoted,  with  what  appear 
to  be  exact  references,  in  the  Annales  des  Sciences 
Psychiques,*  though  the  prophecy  after  all  does 
not  amount  to  very  much. 

At  the  beginning  of  June,  1905,  a  certain 
Scandinavian  merchant,  a  Mr.  Thorlakur  O. 
Johnson,  had  a  vision  of  the  death  by  an 
accident  of  the  reigning  King  Frederick  VIII 
of  Denmark,  and  it  was  in  some  way  conveyed 
to  him  that  this  would  take  place  in  1912.  He 
narrated  the  vision  next  day  to  a  friend,  a  Mr. 

1  See  Notes  and  Queries,  December  7th,   1872,  p.  450;  also 
April  26th,  1873. 
*  Annales  des  Sciences  Psyckiques,  August,  1912,  pp.  z$o-i. 


A  Public  Event  foretold          1 1 9 

Thorkell  Thorlaksson,  and  induced  the  latter  to 
make  a  formal  record  of  it  in  these  terms : 
"  King  Frederick  VIII  will  die  in  the  course  of 
1912  as  the  result  of  an  accident. "  Mr.  Johnson 
seems  also  to  have  mentioned  the  vision  to 
several  other  persons,  amongst  the  rest  to  Mr. 
G.  T.  Zoega,  a  well-known  scholar,  author  of 
an  Icelandic  dictionary  published  by  the  Claren- 
don Press.  The  fact  is  curious,  and  it  seems 
well  authenticated,  but  it  may  be  doubted  whether 
this  fulfilment  of  what  seems  to  have  been  no 
more  than  an  exceptionally  vivid  dream  can  be 
considered  to  lie  outside  the  range  of  mere 
accidental  coincidence.  Most  assuredly  we 
should  have  heard  nothing  of  the  matter  if  the 
prediction  had  not  been  fulfilled. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  SO-CALLED  PROPHECY  OF  ST.   MALACHY 

IN  the  course  of  the  preceding  chapters 
reference  has  many  times  been  made  to 
certain  mottoes  attached  to  the  Popes  of 
these  latter  times.  Almost  every  reader 
is  aware  that  the  phrase  crux  de  cruce 
(cross  from  a  cross)  is  identified  with  Pius 
IX,  that  lumen  in  ccelo  (light  in  the  heavens) 
belongs  to  Leo  XIII,  that  Pius  X  and 
his  present  Holiness,  Benedict  XV,  are  re- 
spectively characterized  as  ignis  ardens  (burning 
fire)  and  religio  depopulata  (religion  laid  waste). 
Mottoes  such  as  these  and  such  as  those  also 
which  await  the  two  next  Popes,  to  wit,  fides 
intrepida  (undaunted  faith)  and  pastor  angelicus 
(the  angelic  shepherd),  can  cause  no  misgiving 
in  the  mind  of  the  simple-hearted  believer.  He 
likes  to  think  them  divinely  bestowed,  and  he 
knows  of  no  special  reason  why  they  should  be 
pronounced  inappropriate.  Tradition  seems  to 
be  in  their  favour,  and  they  are  so  commonly 
taken  for  granted  that  the  plain  man  is  prompted 
to  conclude  that  if  there  was  any  flaw,  so  to 
speak,  in  their  original  title  to  rank  as  prophetic 


Unknown  to  St.  Bernard          121 

utterances,  the  flaw  has  been  made  good  by 
subsequent  ratification  or  by  what  canonists 
would  call  a  sanatio  in  radice.  This  is  no  doubt 
a  very  natural  attitude  of  mind  and  a  belief  in 
itself  quite  harmless.  None  the  less,  it  is  certainly 
illogical,  and  the  perverse  use  which  has  been 
made  of  these  mottoes  to  bolster  up  predictions 
of  quite  a  different  order  renders  it  desirable  that 
the  fraudulent  and  ignoble  origin  of  this  pre- 
tended prophecy  should  be  more  generally 
understood  than  it  is.1 

The  oracular  utterances  of  which  we  speak 
form  part  of  a  long  series  of  similar  mottoes 
which  is  supposed  to  have  been  delivered  in  the 
spirit  of  prophecy  by  St.  Malachy,  an  Irish 
Cistercian  monk,  who  became  Archbishop  of 
Armagh.  St.  Malachy  lived  in  the  twelfth 
century,  and  was  the  friend  of  St.  Bernard,  who 
wrote  a  short  life  of  him.  The  great  founder  of 
Clairvaux  informs  us  very  casually  that  "  the 
gift  of  prophecy  was  not  denied  "  to  the  saintly 
Archbishop,3  but  with  the  exception  of  this  brief 

1  As  an  illustration  of  the  vogue  which  still  attaches  to  the 
Malachy  prophecy  attention  may  be  called  to  the  two  books 
published  on  the  subject  by  a  French  priest,  the  Abb6  Joseph 
Maitre.  The  first  of  these,  La  Prophetie  des  Papes  attribute 
a  S.  Malachie,  Paris,  1901,  contains  880  pages.  The  second, 
Les  Papes  et  la  Papaute  d'apres  la  Prophttie  attribute  d  S. 
Malachie,  Paris,  1902,  contains  778  pages.  Needless  to  add 
that  the  Abb6  Maitre  is  an  ardent  champion  of  the  authenticity 
of  the  prophecy. 

3  "  Si  bene  advertimus  pauca  ista  quae  dicta  sunt,  non  pro- 
phetia  defuit  illi,  non  revelatio,  non  ultio  impiorum,  non  gratia 
sanitatum,  non  mutatio  mentium,  non  denique  mortuorum 
suscitatio  "  (Vita  Malachice,  cap.  29). 


122         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

remark  no  word  has  ever  been  produced  from 
any  mediaeval  author  making  reference  to  the 
prophecies  with  which  his  name  is  now  con- 
nected.1 It  was  not  until  four  centuries  and  a 
half  later  that  the  world  first  heard  of  his  col- 
lection of  mottoes  for  future  Popes.  In  1595 
Dom  Arnold  Wion,  a  Benedictine  monk,  origin- 
ally of  Douai,  published  in  Venice  a  book  called 
Lignum  Vitce,  Ornamentum  et  Decus  Ecclesice, 
dealing  mainly  with  the  glories  of  the  Bene- 
dictine Order.  His  work  was  comprehensive, 
and  included  the  Cistercians  as  well  as  Bene- 
dictines proper.  He  had  consequently  occasion 
to  mention  St.  Malachy,  the  Cistercian  Arch- 
bishop of  Armagh,  and  at  the  end  of  his  short 
notice  of  the  saint  he  remarks  : 

Three  epistles  of  St.  Bernard  addressed  to  St. 
Malachy  are  still  extant  (viz.,  313,  316,  and  317). 
Malachy  himself  is  reported  to  have  been  the  author 
of  some  little  tractates,  none  of  which  I  have  seen 
up  to  the  present  time,  except  a  certain  prophecy 
of  his  concerning  the  Sovereign  Pontiffs.  This,  as 
it  is  short  and  has  never  been  printed,  is  inserted 
here,  seeing  that  many  people  have  asked  for  it. 

1  J.  Schmidlin  has  pointed  out  that  St.  Bernard  in  his  Life 
of  St.  Malachy  refers  to  the  Archbishop's  gift  of  prophecy  in 
one  or  two  other  passages,  but  on  the  other  hand  it  is  certain 
that  St.  Bernard  himself  did  not  believe  in  a  long  succession 
of  future  Popes,  for  he  always  preached  and  maintained  that 
the  end  of  the  world  was  near.  We  can  only  conclude  that  he 
knew  nothing  of  St.  Malachy 's  long  list  of  in  papal  mottoes. 
See  Schmidlin  in  Festgabe  Heinrich  Finke  gewidmet  (Miinster 
i.  W.,  1904),  pp.  16-17. 


The  early  Mottoes  123 

Then  follows  the  list  of  in  mottoes,1  beginning 
with  Ex  castro  Tiberis,  which  is  assigned  to 
Pope  Celestine  II  (1143-4).  Wion  prints  each 
motto  side  by  side  with  the  name  of  the  Pope 
to  which  it  refers,  and  with  a  short  elucidation  to 
explain  how  the  phrase  applied.  This  interpre- 
tation was,  he  tells  us,  the  work  of  Father 
Alphonsus  Ciacconius,  O.P.  Of  course,  when 
Wion  gets  down  to  his  own  times  he  can  no 
longer  offer  any  explanations,  and  so  after  No.  74, 
De  rore  coeli  (From  the  dew  of  Heaven),  applied 
to  Urban  VII,  1590,  all  the  remaining  mottoes 
are  simply  set  down  in  order  without  comment. 
For  our  present  purpose  it  is  the  early  mottoes 
occurring  before  that  of  Urban  VII  which 
specially  claim  our  attention.  Perhaps  without 
printing  the  whole  list,  it  may  be  well  to  give 
a  short  specimen.  I  have  selected  it  almost  at 
random,  and,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  the  mottoes 
chosen  are  neither  more  nor  less  extravagant 
than  the  rest.  It  seems  unnecessary  to  quote  the 
interpretations  in  the  original  Latin. 

Supposed  prophecy  of         Name    of          Interpretation   attr{- 
St.  Malachy.  corresponding      buted   to    Ciacconius. 

Pope. 

(29)  Ex  rosa  leonina  Honorius  IV  He  belonged  to  the 
(from  a  leonine  (1285-1287).  family  of  Savelli, 
rose).  whose  coat  of  arms 

was   a    rose   held   by 
two  lions. 

1  Religio  depopulata,  which  apparently  falls  to  the  lot  of 
Benedict  XV,  is  the  one  hundred  and  fourth  in  the  series  and 
seven  still  remain  to  be  fulfilled. 


124         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 


Supposed  prophecy  of 
St.  Malachy. 

(30)  Picus  inter  escas 
(a  magpie  amongst 
dainties). 

(31)  Ex  eremo  celsus 
(exalted  from  the 
desert). 

(32)  Ex        undararum 
benedict i  one 
(from  the  benedic- 
tion of  the  waves). 

(33)  Concionator  Patar- 
eus 

(the    preacher    of 
Patara). 

(34)  Defessisaquitanicis 
(from  the  Aquita- 
nian  fesses). 


Name  of 
corresponding 

Pope. 

Nicholas  IV 
(1288-1292) 

Celestine  V 
(1295)- 

Boniface  VI 1 1 
(1294-1303). 


Benedict  XI 
(1303-1304), 


Clement  V 
(1305-1314). 


(35)  De  sutore  osseo        John  XXII 
(from  the  bony  or 
osseous     shoe- 
maker). 


Interpretation  attri- 
buted to  Ciacconius. 

He  came  from  the  town 
of  Ascoli  or  Escoli  in 
Ptcenum. 

He  was  formerly  called 
Peter  de  Morrone,1 
and  was  a  hermit. 

H  i  s  Christian  name 
was  Benedict,  and  he 
had  waves  for  his 
coat  of  arms. 

He  was  called  Brother 
Nicholas,2  and  be- 
longed to  the  Order 
of  Preachers. 

He  was  a  native  of 
Aquitaine,  and  had 
fesses  for  his  coat  of 
arms. 

A  Frenchman,  the  son 
of  a  shoemaker, 
whose  family  name 
was  Ossa.3 


Foolish  and  trivial  as  the  commentary  may 
sound,  there  is  no  room  for  doubt  that  these 
interpretations  and  no  others  were  intended  by 
the  author  of  the  prophecy.  The  most  ardent 
defenders  of  its  authenticity  have  never  suggested 

1  Ciacconius'  interpretation,  supposing  it  to  be  his,  would 
hardly  be  intelligible  to  any  one  but  an  Italian.  He  apparently 
wishes  to  convey  that  celsus  in  the  prophecy  was  suggested  by 
the  word  gelso,  which  is  a  synonym  in  Italian  for  moro,  or 
morone,  a  mulberry-tree.  It  must  be  remembered  that  in  the 
Italian  pronunciation,  with  a  soft  g  and  'a  soft  ch  for  c,  the 
words  gelso  and  celso  resemble  each  other  more  closely  than 
they  would  do  in  English. 

3  The  interpreter  assumes  that  his  readers  will  know  that  St. 
Nicholas  was  a  native  of  Patara,  and  might  readily  be  called 
patareus,  the  Patarean. 

3  This  is  untrue,  see  p.  147. 


Papal  Arms  125 

anything  substantially  different,  and  once  the 
fact  is  grasped  that  the  mottoes  are  derived 
sometimes  from  the  armorial  bearings,  some- 
times from  the  cardinalitial  title,  sometimes  from 
the  Christian  or  family  name,  and  sometimes 
from  the  place  of  origin  of  the  Pope,  or  from  a 


SUPPOSED  ARMS  OF  GREGORY  X. 

"  Vir  anguineus." 


ARMS    OF    POPE    HONORIUS    IV. 

"  Ex  rosa  leonina." 


combination  of  two  or  more  of  these  elements,  a 
sort  of  law  will  be  found  to  run  through  the 
whole.  Certainly,  the  identifications  are  in  the 
aggregate  so  striking  as  far  to  transcend  the 
possibilities  of  mere  coincidence.  It  is  conceiv- 
able that  the  motto  anguinus  (sic)  vir  (the  ser- 
pentine man),  assigned  to  Gregory  X,  might  by 


126         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

mere  accident  have  corresponded  with  the  fact 
that  the  Pontiff  in  question  bore  a  snake  in  his 
coat  of  arms,1  or  it  might  have  happened  by 
chance  that  Clement  IV — draco  depressus  (the 
dragon  overthrown) — displayed  an  eagle  on  his 
shield  treading  under  foot  a  prostrate  dragon  ;3 
but  it  is  surely  impossible  that  any  lucky  guess 
could  show  a  score  (or  rather  several  score)  of 
such  hits,  or  could  exactly  fit  the  case  of  two 
Popes  related  to  each  other,  as  were  the  two 
Borgias,  Callistus  III  and  Alexander  VI.  I 
think  I  am  right  in  saying  that  these  two  Popes 
are  the  only  two  in  the  list  who  blazoned  a  bull 
upon  their  escutcheon.  In  Malachy 's  list  a  bull 
is  also  twice  mentioned,  viz.,  in  the  case  of  just 
these  two  Popes.  In  the  shield  of  Callistus  III 
there  are  no  quarterings,  but  the  quadruped  is 
represented  in  Panvinio  with  its  head  down,  and 
with  tufts  of  grass  at  its  feet.  The  motto  assigned 
to  Callistus  by  St.  Malachy  is  bos  pascens  (the 
bull  grazing).  In  the  case  of  Alexander  the  bull 
only  appears  in  Panvinio  in  the  dexter  half  of 
the  shield  without  any  indication  of  grass.  The 
motto  of  Alexander  VI  in  the  same  prophecy  is 
Bos  Albanus  in  Portu  (an  Alban  bull  in  a 
harbour),  which  is  explained  when  we  remember 

1  These  are  the  arms  assigned  him  by  Panvinio,  but  it  is 
practically  certain  that  they  are  quite  incorrect.  Gregory  did 
not  belong  to  the  Visconti  of  Milan.  See  Mgr.  Barbier  de 
Montault,  CEuvres,  vol.  iii.,  p.  366,  and  Woodward,  Ecclesias- 
tical Heraldry,  p.  159. 

3  This  again  is  wrong,  as  we  shall  see  later,  though  given  by 
Panvinio  and  those  who  copy  him. 


Ready  Acceptance  127 

that  Cardinal  Borgia  had  held  successively  the 
cardinalitial  titles  of  Episcopus  Albanus  and 
Episcopus  Portuensis.  No  reasonable  man, 
therefore,  would  hesitate  to  admit  the  preter- 
natural character  of  such  vaticinations,  if  only 
the  fact  were  established  that  the  prophecy  had 
preceded  the  event.  But  there  precisely  comes 
the  difficulty,  for,  as  already  stated,  not  one 
scrap  of  evidence  has  ever  been  adduced  to  show 
that  St.  Malachy's  prophecy  about  the  Popes 
had  been  quoted,  or  even  heard  of,  before  it  was 
published  by  Wion  in  1595. 

The  list  of  Papal  prophecies  in  the  Lignum 
Vitce,  though  occupying  only  a  few  inconspic- 
uous pages  in  the  middle  of  a  big  book,1  very 
soon  attracted  attention.  We  find  it  frequently 
reprinted  in  variou^  historical  works  of  consider- 
able bulk,  as  for  instance  in  Messingham's 
Florilegium  Insulce  Sanctorum,  and  also  issued 
separately  as  a  tract  of  a  few  leaves  with  ex- 
planations in  the  vernacular.8  In  1663  seemingly 
appeared  the  first  refutation  of  these  pretended 
prophecies  by  a  Franciscan  Friar  named  Car- 
ri£re,*  and  this  exposure  was  supported  and 

1  Lignum  Vitas,  pt.  i,  pp.  307-11.  The  five  divisions  of  the 
work,  with  supplementary  matter,  fill  more  than  1800  pages  in 
all. 

a  An  edition  in  Latin  and  Dutch,  printed  at  The  Hague  in 
1645,  is  in  the  British  Museum. 

*  This  book  I  have  not  seen.  Weingarten,  who  in  his  article 
on  the  subject  in  Studien  und  Kritiken,  1857,  p.  560,  gives  1629 
as  the  date  of  the  first  edition  of  the  Digesta  Chronologice 
Pontificia,  seems  to  have  confused  both  title  and  date.  See 
Maitre,  La  Prophdtie  des  Papes,  p.  70. 


128         Prophecy  of -St.  Malachy 

enforced  by  the  high  authority  of  Father  Pape- 
broech  the  Bollandist,  and  especially  by  Father 
Menestrier,  another  distinguished  Jesuit,  who 
devoted  a  special  essay  to  the  subject.1  The 
arguments  of  these  writers  are  in  themselves 
conclusive.  No  person  of  sound  judgment  who 
will  take  the  trouble  to  peruse  the  detailed 
analysis  of  the  prophecies  given  by  the  last- 
named  writer  can  hesitate  for  a  moment  in  his 
verdict  as  to  their  spuriousness.  He  points  out 
in  the  first  place  that  there  is  absolutely  no  trace 
to  be  found  of  any  such  oracles  before  the 
appearance  of  Wion's  book.  Not  only  do  we 
find  no  mention  of  them  among  the  writings  of 
St.  Malachy's  contemporaries,  but  no  mediaeval 
manuscript  is  known  to  contain  them,  no  author 
cites  them,  though  many  interested  themselves 
in  such  subjects,  and  Wion,  who  published  the 
document  with  its  interpretation,  says  not  a  word 
as  to  whence  or  under  what  circumstances  he  had 
obtained  it.2  Secondly,  Father  Menestrier  lays 
stress  upon  the  appearance  in  such  a  list  of  eight 
Antipopes,  usually  without  any  sign  to  distin- 

1  Lest  I  should  seem  to  imply  that  the  Society  of  Jesus  as  a 
body  was  arrayed  against  the  authenticity  of  these  prophecies, 
I  may  mention  that  the  Lux  Evangelica  of  Father  Henry 
Engelgrave,  S.J.,  took  the  other  side,  and  had  probably  more  to 
do  with  obtaining  popular  credence  for  the  mottoes  than  any 
other  work  of  that  age.  Father  Cornelius  a  Lapide,  in  his 
commentary  on  the  Apocalypse,  also  seems  to  place  full  con- 
fidence in  the  prediction. 

3  If  Ciacconius,  or  his  nephew,  were  really  responsible  for 
the  interpretations,  it  is  most  significant  that  not  a  word  is  said 
of  the  prophecy  in  the  works  of  this  historian  of  the  Popes. 


The  Mottoes  Meaningless          129 

guish  them  from  the  genuine  Popes.  The  true 
Pope,  Urban  VI,  is,  on  the  contrary,  designated 
by  the  words  de  inferno  prcegnante  (out  of  the 
womb  of  hell),  while  the  Antipope  is  described 
as  crux  apostolica  (the  cross  of  the  Apostles). 
No  doubt  it  might  be  said  that  the  prophet  looks 
only  to  the  historic  fact  that  rightly  or  wrongly 
such  men  did  figure  before  the  eyes  of  their 
contemporaries  as  Vicars  of  Christ;  and  if  we 
were  dealing  with  a  case  of  clairvoyance,  or 
second  sight,  the  plea  might  be  accepted.  But 
then  these  are  supposed  to  be  facts  communicated 
to  the  saint  by  divine  revelation  presumably  for  ^ 
some  useful  end.  What  possible  end  of  edifica-  ; 
tion  or  utility  can  be  served  by  a  series  of 
quibbling  enigmas  in  which  such  a  Pontiff  as 
Innocent  XI,  a  man  conspicuous  for  his  personal 
sanctity,  is  described  as  bellua  insatiabilis  (in- 
satiable monster),  in  which  another  Pope  is 
identified  with  the  motto,  to  follow  the  received 
reading,  of  sus  in  cribro  (a  sow  in  a  sieve),1  and 
in  which  the  learned  and  exemplary  Benedict 
XIV  figures  as  animal  rurale  (a  country  beast)? 
But  the  most  conclusive  argument  against  the 
genuineness  of  the  prophecy,  as  was  pointed  out 
by  its  earliest  critics,  lies  in  the  striking  contrast 
between  the  success  and  uniformity  of  the  earlier 

1  I  am  tempted  to  think  that  the  proper  reading  may  be  avis, 
The  arms  of  the  Crivelli,  as  pictured  by  Panvinio,  show  a  bird 
(an  eagle?)  above  the  sieve.  I  know  of  no  evidence  that  the 
family,  as  the  interpreters  state,  ever  had  a  sow  in  their  coat  of 
arms. 


130         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

interpretations  and  the  failure  and  wide  diversity 
of  the  later  ones.  The  document  was  first  given 
to  the  world  in  1595,  and  down  to  this  epoch  the 
mottoes  without  an  exception1  fit  their  subjects 
accurately.  That  they  are  far-fetched,  ridiculous, 
and  purposeless  is  not  disputed,  but,  as  already 
remarked,  they  follow  some  sort  of  system.  After 
that  date  their  interpretation  becomes  practically 
hopeless,  and  there  is  hardly  a  proportion  of  one 
in  six  in  which  any  semblance  of  probability 
attaches  to  the  explanations  suggested.  If  the 
motto  can  be  got  to  fit  the  subject  at  all,  it  is 
only  by  adopting  a  system  of  interpretation 
which  is  entirely  without  a  parallel  in  the  earlier 
part  of  the  list.3  Down  to  the  end  of  the  sixteenth 
century  there  is  not  one  single  instance  in  which 
the  events  of  any  Pope's  reign  are  alluded  to  in 
his  motto.9  This  motto  refers  in  every  case 
exclusively  to  circumstances  connected  with  the 
Cardinal  previously  to  his  election  to  the  Papacy 
— for  instance,  to  his  coat  of  arms,  his  family 
or  birthplace,  his  episcopal  sees,  or  title  as 
Cardinal,  his  Christian  name  (never,  be  it  noted, 

1  I  believe  that  the  slight  difficulties  which  occur  in  the  case 
of  one  or  two,  may  be  satisfactorily  accounted  for  by  the 
possible  misprints  or  misreadings  in  the  copy  printed  by  Wion. 

8  Professor  Harnack  has  been  the  first,  I  think,  to  lay  stress 
upon  this  in  the  Zeitschrift  fur  Kirchengeschichte,  vol.  iii, 
p.  321. 

8  Perhaps  the  frumentum  floccidum  of  Pope  Marcellus  II, 
which  seems  to  refer  to  the  shortness  of  his  reign,  might  be 
considered  an  exception,  but,  as  I  shall  show,  it  is  in  any  case 
an  exception  which  proves  the  rule. 


Before  and  after  Publication       1 3 1 

the  name  assumed  by  him  in  becoming  Pope),1 
or  even  the  manner  of  his  early  training  and  the 
Religious  Order  he  belonged  to.  But  of  the 
events  of  the  Papacy  never  a  hint.  Even  such 
conspicuous  figures  as  Innocent  III,  Boniface 
VIII,  Nicholas  V,  Pius  II,  Leo  X,  are  all  desig- 
nated by  some  absurd  verbal  quibble  connected 
with  their  family  name,  their  coats  of  arms,  or 
what  not,  but  there  is  absolutely  not  an  allusion 
to  the  part  each  played  as  Head  of  the  Church 
in  the  secular  or  religious  history  of  his  time.a 
On  the  other  hand,  the  few  Pontiffs  of  the  last 
three  centuries  who  can  in  any  intelligible 
manner  be  connected  with  the  mottoes  assigned 
them,  owe  the  identification  in  almost  every  case 
to  the  events  of  their  Pontificate.  Peregrinus 
apostolicus  is  no  doubt  an  admirably  appropriate 
label  for  the  chequered  career  of  Pius  VI,  but  it 
describes  his  life  as  a  Pope  and  not  as  a 
Cardinal.  Aquila  rapax  may  be  thought  by 
some  to  signalize  the  Pontificate  of  Pius  VII  by 
a  reference  to  the  ravening  eagle  of  the  first 

1  It  may  be  urged  that  in  celsus  ex  eremo,  which  betokens  St. 
Celestine  V,  celsus  is  meant  as  a  contraction  of  Celestinus  ;  but, 
as  shown  in  a  previous  note,   a  quite  different  explanation  is 
forthcoming,  and  this  last  is  obviously  the  explanation  suggested 
by  the  interpreter. 

2  Innocent   III    is   comes   signatus,   he   was   a   count   of  the 
family  of  Segni ;   Boniface  VIII   is  ex  undarum   benedictions, 
from  his  Christian  name  Benedict,  and  the  waves  in  his  coat  of 
arms  ;  Nicholas  V,  from  his  humble  birth  at  Luna,  is  called  de 
modicitate  lunce ;  Pius  II,   who  had  served  the  two  Cardinals, 
Capranica  and  Albergato,  is  de  capra  et  albergo ;  Leo  X,  the  son 
of  Lawrence  de  Medici,  and  the  pupil  of  Politian,  is  de  craticula 
Politiana.  from  the  gridiron  of  Politian. 


T  32         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

French  Empire,  but  again  it  is  the  Pontificate 
which  is  in  question,  not  the  Pope's  antecedents 
before  his  election.  Crux  de  cruce  would  stand 
well  enough  for  the  cross  laid  upon  the  shoulders 
of  Pius  IX  by  the  white  cross  of  Savoy,  but 
once  more  the  cross  is  one  which  came  to  him 
only  after,  and  long  after,  he  had  taken  up  the 
government  of  the  Church. 

On  the  other  hand,  in  the  prophecies  of  the 
last  three  centuries  an  heraldic  interpretation 
hardly  ever  presents  itself.  In  the  mottoes  of 
the  seventy-four  Popes  before  1590  there  are 
twenty-eight  plain  references  to  different  coats  of 
arms,1  and  this  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the 
arms  of  many  of  the  earlier  Popes  were  not 
known.  Since  1595  there  have  been  only  three 
mottoes  which  can  with  any  sort  of  probability 
be  explained  by  the  Popes'  armorial  bearings. 
One  of  these  instances  is  that  of  a  pontiff  of  quite 
modern  times.  The  lumen  in  coelo,  a  delightfully 
vague  description,  is  usually  interpreted  of  the 
comet  which  appears  with  the  fleurs-de-lys  and 
the  cypress-tree  in  the  shield  of  Leo  XIII.  Twice 
before  in  his  earlier  mottoes  the  prophet  had 
referred  to  some  heavenly  body,  and  on  each 
occasion  called  it  sidus.  Why  on  this  occasion, 
if  he  really  meant  a  star,  he  should  have  chosen 
so  much  more  ambiguous  a  word,  does  not 

1  L'Abbe"  Maitre,  La  Prophetic  des  Papes  (Paris,  1901),  pp. 
194-220,  considers  that  there  are  thirty-one  allusions  to  papal 
coats  of  arms  during  this  same  period. 


A  Keeper  of  Mountains          1 3  3 

appear.  Of  the  twenty-eight  Popes  who  have 
reigned  since  1590,  no  less  than  eleven  have  a 
single  star  or  a  group  of  stars  displayed  more  or 
less  conspicuously  in  their  coats  of  arms.  To 
each  one  of  these  the  motto  lumen  in  ccelo 
would  have  applied  quite  as  well  as  to  Leo  XIII. 
Again,  there  is  the  motto  which  falls  to  the  lot 
of  Alexander  VII ;  custos  montium.  His  arms 
are  three  hills  with  a  star  above  them,  and  it 
may  be  admitted  that  the  interpretation  is  to  this 
extent  satisfactory.  But  the  coincidence  is  far 
from  a  marvellous  one.  A  glance  at  the  armorial 
bearings  of  the  Roman  Cardinals  at  any  period 
will  show  quite  a  large  proportion  of  shields  in 
which  a  group  of  the  conventional  mountain 
peaks  looking  like  thimbles  are  conspicuously 
displayed.  Out  of  the  last  thirty  Popes,  moun- 
tains appear  in  the  arms  of  five.  The  probability 
against  such  a  phrase  as  montium  custos  fitting 
any  individual  Pope  would  therefore  be  about 
six  to  one.  But  it  is  really  much  less,  for  if  the 
Pontiff  in  question  had  held  such  a  cardinalitial 
title  as  St.  Martini  in  Montibus,  St.  Stephani  in 
Monte  Ccelio,  or  St.  Petri  in  Monte  Aureo,  the 
prophecy  would  assuredly  be  claimed  as  a 
striking  instance  of  successful  divination.  What 
is  more,  the  prediction  would  be  considered  veri- 
fied if  such  a  Pope  had  been  born,  or  had  been 
bred,  or  had  been  Bishop  in  any  one  of  the  fifty 
Italian  townships  whose  name  begins  with 
Monte,  or  had  been  Legate  in  Montenegro,  or 


134  Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 
had  lived  in  the  Alps  or  the  Apennines,  or  even 
had  been  known  to  take  his  daily  constitutional 
on  the  Pincio.  As  for  the  one  remaining  motto 
which  the  champions  of  the  prophecy  profess  to 
explain  heraldically,  I  can  only  say  that  the 
attempt  is  itself  a  hopeless  confession  of  weak- 
ness. On  the  ground  that  the  coat  of  arms  of 
Innocent  XI  exhibits  a  lion  and  sometimes  an 
eagle,  it  is  maintained  that  there  is  sufficient 
justification  for  the  motto  assigned  to  him  of 
bellua  insatiabilis — insatiable  beast  !l 

Surely  it  is  unnecessary  to  argue  the  subject 
further.  If  the  prophecy  were  an  inspired  pre- 
diction of  St.  Malachy  in  the  twelfth  century,  it 
is  inexplicable  why  the  mottoes  should  be  easily 
verifiable,  systematic,  and  largely  heraldic,  down 
to  the  date  when  the  prophecies  were  first 
printed,  and  then  should  suddenly  change  their 
character  completely.  On  the  supposition,  how- 
ever, that  it  is  a  forgery  of  about  the  year  1590, 
this  is  exactly  what  we  should  expect  to  find. 

Of  all  the  later  mottoes,  the  nearest  approach 
to  a  hit  seems  to  be  that  which  is  assigned  to 
Gregory  XVI,  de  balneis  Etrurice.  There  is  a 
place  known  as  Bagno  (Balneum)  in  Tuscany 
(i.e.,  Etruria).  It  is  true  that  Gregory  was  not 

1  According  to  Woodward,  the  correct  blazon  of  the  arms  of 
Innocent  XI  (Odescalchi)  is — "  vair,  on  a  chief  gules  a  lion 
passant  argent,  this  chief  abaisse"  under  another  of  the  empire 
(eagle)."  The  markings  of  the  fur  vair  have  curiously  been 
turned  into  lamps  or  cups  in  many  of  the  copies.  See  Notes 
and  Queries,  6th  series,  vol.  vi,  p.  82,  and  vol.  vii,  p.  198; 
yth  series,  vol.  vi,  p.  205. 


A  Dog  and  a  Snake  i  35 

born  there  and  had  personally  no  connection 
with  it ;  but  he  had  been  a  Camaldolese  monk, 
and  this  particular  village  in  the  Apennines, 
called  Bagno,  was  associated  with  the  life  of  St. 
Romuald,  the  founder  of  the  Order,  and  was 
only  a  few  miles  from  the  desert  of  Camaldoli. 
Still,  even  here  no  one  could  ever  say  that  the 
name  Bagno  was  so  intimately  associated  with 
the  Camaldolese  Order  that  it  could  popularly 
be  accepted  as  a  synonym  for  the  desert  itself. 
Manresa  might  stand  for  the  Jesuits  perhaps, 
and  Monte  Cassino  for  the  Benedictines,  but  we 
should  not  dream  of  identifying  the  hermit  monks 
of  St.  Romuald  with  the  town  of  Bagno  di 
Romana.  As  for  the  majority  of  the  interpre- 
tations attached  to  the  later  prophecies  by  such 
champions  of  their  authenticity  as  Maitre, 
Gorgeu,  or  Cucherat,  they  are  hopelessly  far- 
fetched and  extravagant.  For  example,  the  motto 
which  falls  to  Leo  XII  is  canis  et  coluber  (a  dog 
and  a  snake).  There  is  nothing  of  the  sort  in 
his  coat  or  arms,  so  Cucherat  is  satisfied  to 
believe  that  Leo  combined  the  vigilance  of  a 
dog  with  the  prudence  of  a  serpent,  though  he 
suggests  as  equally  satisfactory  the  explanation 
that  the  revolutionary  agitators  of  his  reign 
barked  against  him  like  dogs  and  crawled  like 
serpents.  Interpretation  is  easy  on  such  terms. 
So  again,  when  Urban  VIII  (Barberini,  with 
three  bees  for  his  coat  of  arms)  is  designated  by 
lilium  et  rosa  (the  lily  and  the  rose),  we  are  told 


136         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

that  "  he  was  a  native  of  Florence,  a  town  which 
takes  its  name  from  flowers,  and  the  bees  which 
appear  in  his  coat  of  arms  are  particularly  fond 
of  lilies  and  roses."  The  rest  are  little  better. 

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  these  considera- 
tions in  any  way  exhaust  the  arguments  which 
might  be  urged  against  the  genuineness  of  the 
so-called  prophecy.  I  reserve  for  later  treatment 
one  or  two  points  which  seem  to  me  practically 
conclusive.  But  it  will  be  best  before  going 
further  to  offer  some  explanation  regarding  the 
probable  origin  of  the  list  of  mottoes  printed  by 
Wion.  And,  be  it  remarked  in  passing,  we 
cannot  too  often  remind  ourselves  that  Wion's 
^,1  text  is  the  ultimate  and  only  source  of  every 
modern  copy.  There  is  not  even  a  single  one  of 
the  mottoes  which  has  been  found  existing 
separately  and  professing  to  derive  from  some 
other  document  prior  to,  or  independent  of,  the 
Lignum  Vitce. 

If  the  prophecy  of  St.  Malachy  has  met  with 
as  much  favour  as  it  has  done,  despite  all  the 
refutations  of  which  it  has  been  the  object,  the 
fact,  I  think,  is  largely  due  to  the  feeling  latent 
in  many  minds,  that  it  would  not  have  been 
possible  or,  at  any  rate,  worth  while  to  fabricate 
such  a  list.  The  tolerably  minute  acquaintance 
which  it  supposes  with  Papal  history  and 
heraldry  are  such  that  it  is  difficult  to  believe  that 
a  person  so  gifted — we  are  speaking,  it  must  be 
remembered,  of  the  year  1590 — would  condescend 


Panvinio's  Pope-Book  137 

to  this  kind  of  fraud.  This  objection  would  not 
be  without  its  weight  if  it  were  not  that  we  are 
able  to  point  to  one,  or  more  accurately  speaking,  / 
to  two  definite  works  which  offered  ready  to/ 
hand  all  the  information  the  forger  wanted.  A 
careful  examination  and  minute  comparison  of 
these  books  with  the  first  seventy  mottoes  attri- 
buted to  St.  Malachy  will  render  it  clear  beyond 
the  possibility  of  doubt  that  the  author  of  the 
prophecy  worked  with  these  books  open  before 
him.  Without  a  single  exception  these  volumes 
explain  the  origin  of  every  detail,  every  triviality 
to  be  met  with  in  the  so-called  prophecy  down  to 
the  time  of  Paul  IV  (1555).  The  few  intervening 
years  before  1590  needed  no  research,  they  would 
have  been  fresh  in  the  memory  of  every  one. 
I  speak  of  two  works,  but  they  were  in  reality  but 
one,  and  they  had  but  a  single  author.  Onofrio 
Panvinio,  a  famous  Roman  antiquary,  had  col- 
lected, at  the  direct  suggestion  of  the  Sovereign 
Pontiff,  a  mass  of  historical  material  to  elucidate 
the  History  of  the  Popes  by  Platina.  He  had 
compiled  lists  of  the  Cardinals  created  in  each 
Pontificate,  with  drawings  of  their  armorial 
bearings  and  brief  summaries  of  the  lives  of 
those  who  were  elected  to  occupy  the  chair  of 
St.  Peter.  Somehow  or  other  the  manuscript  of 
these  supplementary  collections  passed  out  of 
Panvinio's  keeping  and  apparently  fell  into  the 
hands  of  a  printer  of  Venice,  who  forthwith  had 
all  the  arms  engraved,  and  published  the  book  in 


138         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

!557  as  a  handsome  folio  volume  embellished 
with  an  immense  number  of  blocks  representing 
the  shields  of  Popes  and  Cardinals.  The  author 
got  wind  of  this  when  it  was  too  late,  and 
bitterly  complaining  that  the  work  had  gone  to 
press  from  a  rough  unfinished  copy  abounding 
in  errors,  he  himself  superintended  an  issue  of 
the  text  of  the  same  work,  for  the  most  part  re- 
written and  considerably  modified,  which  like- 
wise saw  the  light  at  Venice  in  the  same  year, 
X557*  On  account  of  the  extreme  haste  with 
which  the  author's  own  edition  had  to  be  pro- 
duced that  it  might  not  lag  behind  its  rival,  it 
was  found  impossible  to  prepare  blocks  with  the 
armorial  bearings.  This  edition  therefore 
appeared  in  quarto  form  and  without  illustra- 
tions, but  the  text  claimed  to  be  in  many  ways 
more  accurate  than  that  of  the  folio  copy,  which 
was  externally  more  sumptuous.  Here  then  in 
these  two  works  we  find  all  the  material  used  in 
fabricating  the  prophecies  of  St.  Malachy.  I 
reproduce  here  a  specimen  taken  from  the  folio 
copy  to  illustrate  the  nature  of  the  information 
which  the  forger  had  ready  to  hand  as  he  com- 
piled his  motto  for  each  Pontiff.  Of  the  three 
shields  which  stand  at  the  head  the  centre  one  is 
that  of  the  Pope  (Boniface  VIII);  the  other  two 
are  those  of  the  two  earliest  Cardinals  of  his 
creation.  Panvinio  knew  nothing  of  the  armorial 
bearings  of  the  second,  and  according  to  his 
custom  drew  the  shield  but  left  it  blank. 


Boniface  VIII  139 

Below  we  have  a  concise  biography  of  the 
Pope  before  his  election  to  the  Papacy.  Through- 
out the  volume  no  attempt  is  made  to  narrate 

BONIFACIVS  PP.  vnl.  NV.  ccxvnl.  AH.  CHR.  ooccx'rxin. 


ii. 


IN    NOMINE    DEI    BT    SALVATORIS    NOSTRI 

JESV    CHRISTI    BENEDICT  i.    AMEN. 

ANCTISS.   D.  ft.  BONIFACIVS  vnl.   PONT.    MAX.  BencdiAus 

nationc  Iralus,patna  Romanuscx  nobih  &antiquafamilia  Caictacu  Ana 

guja  ormndus, Pontificrj  ciiulisque  iitris  peritifsimus,  alti  cordis,  &  reruni 

hmn.inan.imcxpcricntifsimus  .  Hie  a  PP.  Martino  ml.  Diaconus  Card. 

inDiaconia  S.Nicolai  in  carccreTullianocreatusert.moxa  PP.  Nicblao 

niI.presb.Card.cft,ordinatusinit  SS.SiIueftri  &  Martini  intnonti bus. 

Demum  PP.Coclertino  v.  Ncapoli  fponteabdicante,quum(ctanwmoliimpares  humcros 

habcrccognouilfct,  adnitcntc}&iuuante  Regc  Carolo  in  cius  locum  omnium  Cardinalift 

fuffragiis  in  ui ?iUa  Natalis  Domini.hoc eft  i x . C alcnd. lanuarrj  Pontifctf  Ma^imus  rcriun- 

ciatus cft.praeacccflorc  fuo  tnuente .  Scdit autcm  in facraiilsima  fcdc  beati  Pclri  Apolloli, 

annos  odo,mcnfcs  nouera,&  dies  dcccm  &  nouem. 

the  history  of  the  Pontificate  itself.  The  reason 
is  very  simple.  The  work  had  only  been  pre- 
pared, as  Panvinio  tells  us  in  his  preface  to  the 
quarto  edition,  to  supplement  the  history  of  the 


140        Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

Popes  by  Platina.  The  detailed  account  of  each 
Pontificate  was  to  be  found  there,  and  it  was 
useless  to  repeat  it.  The  fabricator  of  the  pro- 
phecies was  content  to  use  this  Epitome  of 
Panvinio  in  its  double  form  to  the  exclusion  of 
everything  else.  It  placed  before  him  the  arms 
of  the  Pope,  where  they  were,  known,  and  a  few 
facts  about  his  parentage,  birthplace,  cardina- 
litial  titles,  etc.  One  or  two  scraps  extracted 
from  this  summary  were  woven  together  in  a 
kind  of  oracular  jargon,  and  behold  the  pro- 
phecy complete.  In  the  case  of  Boniface  VIII, 
the  notice  of  whom  is  here  reproduced,  the 
forger  has  picked  out  the  fact  that  his  Christian 
name  was  Benedict,  and  that  a  wavy  bend  was 
the  sole  charge  upon  his  shield,  and  from  this 
he  has  evolved  the  motto  already  mentioned,  Ex 
undarum  benedictione,  from  the  benediction  of 
the  waves.  The  reader  will  now  readily  see  why 
it  is  that  the  prophecies  down  to  the  close  of  the 
sixteenth  century  contain  no  allusion  to  the 
events  of  any  Pope's  reign.  They  were  not 
introduced  into  the  mottoes,  for  the  simple 
reason  that  they  were  entirely  passed  over  in  the 
book  from  which  the  fabricator  of  the  mottoes 
was  working.  I  have  spoken  of  a  possible  ex- 
ception which  proves  the  rule.  It  is  in  the  case 
of  Pope  Marcellus  II,  whose  premature  death 
after  a  few  weeks'  pontificate  is  said  by  Wion's 
interpreter  (Ciacconius  ?)  to  be  alluded  to  in  the 
motto  Frumentum  floccidum,  drooping  corn. 


Marcellus  II  141 

"  His  arms/'  says  the  interpreter,  "  consisted  of 
a  stag  and  corn ;  it  was  drooping  corn  because 
he  lived  only  a  short  time  in  the  Papacy."  Now 
as  it  so  happens,  Panvinio  in  his  notice  of 
Marcellus  II,  who  was  his  intimate  personal 
friend,  departs  rather  from  his  usual  practice, 
and  concludes  his,  account  by  a  sort  of  little 
panegyric  deploring  the  Pope's  untimely  death. 
"  Whilst  he  strove  (says  Panvinio)  to  reform  the 
Church  of  God,  he  sank  to  earth  like  the  flower 
of  the  morning  "  (tanquam  flos  matutinus 
recidit).  Is  it  unreasonable  to  suppose  that  this 
phrase  taken  with  the  wheat  ears  of  the  coat  of 
arms  suggested  the  frumentum  floccidum  of  the 
prophecy  ?l 

But  here  a  champion  of  the  Malachy  prophecy 
will  possibly  raise  an  objection.  Granted,  he 
may  say,  that  Panvinio  supplies  the  materials 
from  which  a  forger  might  have  fabricated  the 
first  seventy  mottoes,  this  is  after  all  no  proof 
that  the  mottoes  had  actually  no  other  origin. 
Why  could  not  St.  Malachy  have  known  before- 
hand by  revelation  the  facts  which  Panvinio  in 
his  day  acquired  through  a  process  of  historical 
research  ? 

1  Although  the  arms  as  engraved  in  the  folio  Panvinio 
undoubtedly  show  ears  of  corn,  it  seems  probable  that  the  true 
blazon  should  be  bulrushes.  The  family  name  Cervini  comes 
from  cervo  (a  stag),  in  Latin  cervus.  Now  in  Ps.  xli.  i  we 
have  Quemadmodum  desiderat  cervus  ad  fontes  aquarum  (As 
the  hart  panteth  after  the  fountains  of  water).  This  suggests 
bulrushes,  not  ears  of  corn.  See  Woodward,  Ecclesiastical 
Heraldry,  p.  163. 


142         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

To  this  objection  it  would  be  possible  to  return 
a  very  long  reply,  but  I  cannot  persuade  myself 
that  an  exhaustive  demonstration  is  needed.  In 
sum  the  answer  amounts  to  this,  that  it  is  in- 
conceivable that  God  could  have  revealed  the 
future  to  one  of  His  mediaeval  saints  in  the  exact 
form  in  which  the  facts  would  afterwards  be 
known  to  a  renaissance  scholar,  with  all  that 
scholar's  blunders,  misapprehensions,  and  idio- 
syncrasies. Let  us  treat  the  matter  as  concisely 
as  possible  under  these  five  heads. 

1.  Panvinio's  book  is  a  very  peculiar  one.  As 
it  was  written  to  supplement  Platina's  Lives  of 
the  Popes,  it  concerns  itself  only  with  the  ante- 
cedents of  the  prelates  elected  to  the  papacy, 
and  gives   no  account  of   the   history  of  each 
pontificate.  Now,  as  we  have  seen,  the  same  char- 
acteristic marks  the  mottoes  assigned  to  the  first 
seventy  Popes  in  the  Malachy  list.     They  all 
find    their    explanation,    as    their    interpreters 
admit,  not  in  the  events  of  each  pontificate,  but 
in  those  antecedent  details  furnished  by  Pan- 
vinio,  e.g.,  the  Pope's  family  name,  or  coat  of 
arms,    or    cardinalitial    title,    or   birthplace,    or 
origin.     Is  it   not  a  little  extraordinary  that  if 
St.  Malachy,   in  the  twelfth  century,  beheld  a 
vision  of  the  Popes  to  come,  he  should  see  and 
describe,    not   what   each   one   did   as   Christ's 
Vicar,  but  only  the  title  he  held  as  cardinal,  or 
his  arms  or  birthplace  or  family  connections? 

2.  It   has   always  been   objected   against   the 


The  Antipopcs  143 

prophecy  that  true  Popes  and  Antipopes  are 
placed  upon  the  same  footing.  The  mottoes  do 
not,  ordinarily  speaking,  serve  to  distinguish  the 
one  from  the  other.  Strange  to  say,  the  same 
feature  is  found  in  Panvinio.  But  there  are  two 
remarkable  exceptions.  The  Popes  whom  Pan- 
vinio designates  Nicholas  V  (1327),  and  Clement 
VIII  (1424),  appear  in  his  quarto  edition,  with 
the  heading  ANTIPAPA  in  large  capitals,  and 
in  just  these  two  cases,  and  these  two  cases  only, 
we  have  the  idea  of  a  schism  introduced  into  the 
mottoes.  Nicholas  V  is  called  Corvus  schis- 
maticus,  Clement  VIII  Schisma  Barchinonium. 
Moreover,  the  order  of  these  Popes  and  Anti- 
popes,  which  is  most  peculiar,  and  which  is  cen- 
sured by  Menestrier  and  others  for  its  historical 
inaccuracy,  is  exactly  the  order  of  the  revised 
quarto  edition  of  Panvinio.  Probably  no  other 
book  has  ever  been  printed,  save  those  directly 
founded  on  Panvinio,  which  gives  the  Antipopes 
in  precisely  that  relative  position. 

3.  The  irrelevancies  and  extravagances  which 
we  note  in  the  oracular  jargon  of  these  mottoes 
is  over  and  over  again  explained  by  the  casual 
occurrence  of  some  word  in  Panvinio's  brief 
description.  For  example,  Nicholas  III  is 
styled  "  Rosa  composita."  The  rose  is  in  his 
coat  of  arms,  but  where  does  the  composita  come 
from  or  what  does  it  mean  ?  Panvinio  tells  us 
that  a  morum  gravitate  compositus  est  appellatus 
(folio  ed.,  p.  177),  from  the  seriousness  of  his 


144  Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 
character  he  was  called  "  the  composed.**  So 
again,  Nicholas  V  (1447,  not  the  Antipope), 
who  was  born  in  Luna,  is  styled  De  modicitate 
lunce,  whatever  that  may  be  supposed  to  signify. 
The  expression  is  only  explained  when  we  find 
that  Panvinio  describes  him  in  the  folio  edition 
(p.  311)  as  ortus  modicis  parentibus,  born  of 
middle-class  parents. 

4.  It  seems  an  unlikely  thing  that  if  God  had 
really  made  known  to  St.  Malachy,  an  Irishman 
who  lived  much  in  France,  certain  distinctive 
characteristics  which  would  serve  to  identify  the 
future  heads  of  His  Church,  He  should  have 
indicated  them  by  phrases  only  comprehensible 
to  those  who  have  a  knowledge  of  Italian. 
Alexander  Ill's  motto  is  ex  ansere  custode 
(from  a  guardian  goose),  but  we  can  only  inter- 
pret this  when  we  learn — from  Panvinio,  of 
course,  but  the  fact  is  very  doubtful — that  his 
family  name  was  Paparo.  If  one  happens  to 
know  that  papero  in  Italian  means  a  gosling, 
the  connection  is  plain,  but  not  otherwise. 
Similarly  the  mottoes  take  for  granted  the 
reader's  knowledge  that  Caraffa  is  derived  from 
cara  fe  or  fede  (Paul  IV),  that  gelso  and  moro 
both  mean  mulberry-tree  (Celestine  V),  that 
albergo  means  inn  (Pius  II),  that  Caccianimici 
means  putting  your  enemies  to  flight  (Eugenius 
IV),  that  Piccolomini  means  small  man  (Pius 
III),  and  so  forth. 

The  difficulty  is  a  serious  one,  for  to  take  some- 


Precocious  Heraldry  145 

what  broader  ground,  if  there  is  anything  which 
may  be  regarded  as  a  general  principle  in  all  such 
revelations,  it  is  that  the  subjective  element  is 
never  eliminated.  In  Holy  Scripture  itself  the 
prophets  show  that  their  thought  is  coloured  by 
the  conditions  of  their  daily  life,  and  they  express 
themselves  according  to  the  fashion  and  know- 
ledge of  their  contemporaries.  Now  the  pseudo- 
Malachy  writes  not  as  a  mediaeval  monk,  but  as 
a  post-renaissance  Italian.  Whatever  may  be 
said  of  the  antiquity  of  the  science  of  heraldry, 
it  is  unquestionable  that  its  developments  in  the 
early  twelfth  century  were  of  the  rudest  and 
most  primitive  kind.1  The  Roman  of  450  years 
later,  on  the  contrary,  was  forced  to  be  some- 
thing of  a  herald,  for  over  almost  every  building 
upon  which  his  eye  rested  he  might  distinguish 
the  coat  of  arms  of  the  Pontiff  or  the  Prince 
who  had  erected  it.  It  was  natural  enough  for 
an  idler,  who  found  himself  confronted  at  every 
turn  with  lilies,  and  mountains,  and  oak-trees, 
such  as  appear  in  the  shields  of  the  Pontiff,  to 
amuse  his  fancy  with  mottoes  like  Montium 

1  The  late  Marquis  of  Bute  writes  :  "  The  earliest  unquestion- 
able example  of  heraldry  in  the  world  is  stated  by  Planch^  to  be 
the  case  of  Philip  I,  Count  of  Flanders,  on  a  seal  of  1164  ;  and 
it  is  therefore  ra'ther  staggering  to  find  apparent  allusions  of  the 
kind  applying  not  only  to  the  Pope  who  was  reigning  at  that 
time,  but  to  one  who  died  in  1144.  Moreover,  it  is  certainly 
more  probable  than  not  that  St.  Malachy,  who  died  in  1148,  had 
never  heard  of  any  such  thing  as  heraldry  in  his  life." — Dublin 
Review,  October,  7885,  p.  380. 


146         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

Gustos,  Fructus  Jovis  juvabit,1  AZsculapii  phar- 
macum,  Lilium  et  Rosa,  Hyacinthus  Medi- 
corum,2  etc.  No  wonder  that,  as  Menochius 
tells  us  in  his  Stuore,  there  was  a  superstition 
among  the  ignorant  populace  that  the  arms  of 
every  Pope  until  the  end  of  the  world  were  to  be 
found  carved  somewhere  upon  the  bronze  doors 
of  St.  Peter's,  and  could  be  detected  by  any 
one,  if  only  he  had  the  patience  to  puzzle  them 
out.  But  how  should  such  thoughts  come  to  a 
far-off  Irish  monk*  in  the  destitution  of  the  first 
beginnings  of  Clairvaux?  To  the  late  Lord 
Bute  the  mottoes  seemed  self-condemned  by  the 
paganism  of  their  language.  "They  look,"  he 
said,  "  like  indications  of  a  mind  so  blinded  by 
the  heathenism  of  the  later  Renaissance  as  not  to 
perceive  their  extraordinary  incongruity  with 

1  "  The  'acorn   will   aid."     Jove's   fruit   was   the  acorn,  the 
fruit  of  his  sacred  tree.     This  was  the  motto  of  Julius  II  (della 
Rovere).     The  family   name  meant  oak-tree,    and  he  bore  an 
oak-tree  with  golden  acorns  for  his  arms. 

2  Paul  III.     The  hyacinthus  stood  for  the  Farnese  lilies  in 
his  coat  of  arms  as  above.     Medicorum  came  from  his  "  title  " 
of  SS.  Cosmas  and  Damian.     Lord  Bute,  in  his  valuable  essay 
on    the    Prophecy   of    St.    Malachy    (Dublin    Re-view,    October, 
1885),  sees  here  an  allusion  to  the  rare  precious  stone  called  the 
jacinth  (p.  379),  and  thinks  that  it  refers  to  an  heraldic  tincture. 

3  I  am  not  urging  that  the  mottoes  cannot  possibly  be  due  to 
St.  Malachy  merely  because  they  may  seem  extravagant.     Some 
of  the  miracles  attributed  to  this  saint  are,  to  use  the  phrase  of 
the    Abb6    Vacandard,    decidedly    bizarre.     The    following,    for 
instance  :    "  Venit  mulier   gravida  et  vere  gravis.     Indicat   se 
contra    omnes    naturae    leges    retinere    partum    jam    quindecim 
mensibus  et  diebus  viginti  :  Compassus  Malachias  super  novo  et 
inaudito  incommode  orat  et  mulier  parit."     (Malachice   Vitce, 
n.  47.) 


Panvinio's  Blunders  147 

the  alleged   nature  of  the   document   in   which 
they  are  found."1 

5.  But  the  most  conclusive  argument  of  all  is 
the  adoption  and  perpetuation  of  Panvinio's 
mistakes.  For  example,  this  historian,  in  both 
his  editions,  states  that  Eugenius  IV  had  been 
a  Celestine  monk,  and  hence  pseudo-Malachy 
dubs  him  Lupa  coelestina.  But  this  is  simply  a 
blunder,  as  Menestrier  and  others  have  shown.3 
Eugenius  was  an  Augustinian,  not  a  Celestine. 
Again,  Panvinio  supposed  that  the  father  of 
Pope  John  XXII  was  a  shoemaker  named  Ossa, 
and  from  this  we  get  Malachy's  motto,  De  sutore 
osseo,  but  modern  research  pronounces  unhesi- 
tatingly that  his  name  was  Duese  or  D'Euse, 
and  entirely  discredits  the  shoemaker  story.8 
Finally,  in  four  different  cases  in  which  the 
mottoes  are  admittedly  founded  on  the  coat  of 
arms  which  the  Pope  in  question  is  supposed 
to  have  borne,  the  motto  agrees  perfectly  with 
the  coat  of  arms  figured  in  Panvinio,  but  more 
recent  authorities  declare,  and  with  reason,  that 
the  arms  so  figured  are  quite  erroneous.  The 
four  cases  to  which  we  refer  are  those  of  Alex- 
ander III,  Clement  IV,  Gregory  X,  and  Martin 
IV.  In  all  these  cases  Panvinio's  engraving, 
upon  which  the  motto  is  founded,  differs  from 
the  blazon  given  in  such  a  modern  authority  as 

1  Dublin  Review,  p.  381. 

3  See  for  example  Pastor,  History  of  the  Popes,  Eng.  trans., 
vol.  i,  p.  286,  note. 

8  See  Mollat,  Les  Papes  d' Avignon  (Paris,  1912),  p.  43,  note. 


148  Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 
Woodward's  Ecclesiastical  Heraldry.  It  will  be 
sufficient  to  consider  one  example  here.  Accord- 
ing to  pseudo-Malachy  the  motto  belonging  to 
Pope  Clement  IV  (1265-69)  was  draco  depressus 
— the  dragon  crushed — and  this  is  at  once  ex- 
plained when  we  look  at  the  coat  of  arms  pro- 
vided for  the  Pope  in  Panvinio's  folio  edition, 
which  shows  a  dragon  underneath  an  eagle 
which  is  squeezing  it  in  its  talons.  But  later 
authorities  lend  no  countenance  to  this  idea. 
According  to  Woodward,  Pope  Clement  IV's 
arms  were  :  Or,  six  fleurs-de-lis  azure  in  orle ; 
while  his  family  shield  was  Or,  an  eagle  dis- 
played sable,  on  a  bordure  gules  ten  bezants.1 
In  either  case  there  was  no  dragon,  and  unfor- 
tunately it  was  upon  this  feature  alone  that  the 
motto  of  pseudo-Malachy  was  based. 

And  now  before  we  turn  to  speak  briefly  of  the 
possible  occasion  of  the  fabrication  of  these 
mottoes,  it  will  be  well  to  remind  the  reader  of 
one  or  two  points  to  which  prominence  has  been 
given  by  Dollinger  and  others.  Although  no 
word  was  ever  spoken  of  St.  Malachy  as  a  seer 
who  concerned  himself  with  the  succession  to 
the  papacy,  the  famous  Abbot  Joachim  of  Flora 
(c.  1132-1202)  was  accredited  with  a  similar 
series  of  oracula.  He  was  even  on  this  account 
called  par  excellence  papalista  or  papalarius. 
The  mottoes  (it  must  be  confessed,  quite  un- 

1  Woodward,  p.  159.  Cf.  Mr.  Everard  Green  (Somerset 
Herald)  in  Notes  and  Queries,  6th  series,  vol.  vi,  p.  81,  and 
Miss  Buck,  t'b.,  vol.  vii,  p.  489. 


Prevalence  of  Papal  Oracles       149 

warrantably)  attributed  to  his  authorship  were 
not  so  concise  as  those  fathered  on  St.  Malachy, 
and  they  were  much  more  denunciatory  in  tone, 
but  they  had  a  wonderful  vogue  from  the  early 
part  of  the  fourteenth  century  onwards.  Thus 
they  were  followed  by  a  crowd  of  imitations  to 
which  such  names  were  attached  as  Anselm 
Bishop  of  Marsico  (probably  an  altogether 
fictitious  personage),  Jodochus  Palmerius,  the 
Friar  ^Egidius  Polonus,  and  others.  In  nearly 
all  these  collections,  as  Dollinger  points  out,  the 
same  feature  is  observed,  viz.,  that  the  early 
mottoes,  having  been  composed  after  the  event, 
fit  their  subjects  at  least  so  far  that  they  are 
easily  identifiable,  while  the  later,  which  were 
really  fabricated  at  a  venture — a  mere  guess  at 
what  might  be  expected — "  lose  themselves  more 
and  more  in  meaningless,  unintelligible  phrases 
and  commonplaces."1 

Remembering,  then,  the  prevalence  of  this 
species  of  composition — all  of  it  counterfeit  and 
much  of  it,  as  the  printed  editions  show,  still 
enjoying  popular  favour  at  the  end  of  the  six- 
teenth century  and  for  long  afterwards — we  are 
led  to  ask  what  was  the  probable  origin  of  the 
particular  set  of  mottoes  ascribed  to  St.  Malachy. 
Two  suggestions  in  particular  have  been  offered 
to  explain  them.  The  first,  which  has  been 
advocated  by  Hermann  Weingarten,'  lays  the 

1  Dollinger,  Prophecies  and  the  Prophetic  Spirit,  p.  13. 
*  Theologische  Studien  und  Kritiken  (1857),  pp.  555  et  seq. 
L 


150         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

fabrication  at  the  door  of  the  monk  who  first 
published  them,  Dom  Arnold  Wion.  The  Ger- 
man professor  points  out  that  Wion  gives 
absolutely  no  account  of  the  document,  or  of 
how  it  came  into  his  hands,  and  that  it  has  never 
been  shown  to  exist  in  any  other  copy  than  that 
which  appeared  in  Wion's  book.  Further,  we 
may  note  that  this  book  proves  the  author's 
intimate  acquaintance  with  the  two  separate 
editions,  the  Quarto  and  the  Folio,  of  the 
Epitome  of  Panvinio,  from  which,  as  has  been 
shown  above,  the  list  attributed  to  St.  Malachy 
has  almost  certainly  been  fabricated.  I  may  add 
one  other  item  on  the  same  side,  which  seems 
to  have  escaped  the  notice  of  Weingarten.  The 
only  point  in  which  I  have  observed  that 
Malachy's  list  contradicts  the  data  supplied  by 
Panvinio  is  in  the  case  of  Pope  Clement  VI. 
Panvinio,  in  both  editions,  calls  him  Bishop  of 
Aries — episcopus  Arelatensis — as  also  does 
Ciacconius,  but  Malachy's  motto  for  him  is  ex 
rosa  Attrebatensi — "  from  the  rose  of  Arras." 
Now,  in  this  departure  from  Panvinio,  the 
pseudo-Malachy  is  right  and  Panvinio  is  wrong. 
Clement  VI  had  been  Bishop  of  Arras,  not  of 
Aries.  It  becomes  a  little  suspicious  then,  when 
we  find  Wion  in  another  place  in  the  same  book 
correcting  Panvinio  from  his  own  personal 
knowledge  : 

This  Pope  [he  says  of  Clement  VI]  is  described 
by  Panvinio  in  his  Epitome  in  4to  as  Archbishop  of 


Wion's  Correction  151 

Aries  (Arelatensis),  which  I  think  must  be  a  misprint 
for  Arras  (Attrebatensis) ;  for  history  is  silent  about 
any  such  bishopric  of  his  at  Aries.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  have  just  quoted  what  Thomas  (Walsing- 
ham)  says  about  his  election  to  the  see  of  Arras,  and 
this  statement  is  confirmed  by  the  lists  of  the  Bishops 
of  Arras  and  the  pictures  of  the  same,  which  are  to 
be  seen  in  the  Church  of  St.  Mary  at  Arras,  where 
His  Holiness  Clement  V  is  represented  with  the 
insignia  of  the  Sovereign  Pontiff,  as  I  have  myself 
more  than  once  seen  them.1 

None  the  less,  I  doubt  if  any  argument  can 
be  built  upon  this  circumstance.  If  Wion  had 
the  list  of  Malachy's  supposed  prophecies,  and 
believed  them  to  be  genuine,  it  is  extremely 
natural  that,  coming  across  a  designation  which 
he  knew  from  his  personal  investigations  to  be 
erroneous,  he  should  treat  it  simply  as  a  blunder 
of  the  copyist,  and  change  Arelatensi  into 
Attrebatensi  without  calling  attention  to  the 
substitution.  As  an  argument,  this  circumstance 
adds  nothing  to  the  case  against  Wion,  and  I 
must  confess  that  on  the  whole  the  weight  of 
evidence  seems  to  me  against  his  being  himself 
the  forger.3 

This  view  is  also  the  conclusion  of  Prof.  A. 
Harnack,  who  in  an  article  in  the  Zeitschrift  fur 
Kirchengeschichte3  has  treated  this  question 

1  Wion,  Lignum  Vitce,  pt.  i,  p.  159. 

3  It  is,  however,  to  be  noted  that  Wion  was  certainly  very 
keen  about  prophecies.  See  the  Lignum  Vita,  pt.  ii,  pp.  700  ff 
and  803  #. 

s  Vol.    iii,   pp.   315   et  seq. 


152         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

with  special  reference  to  the  theory  of  Wein- 
garten.  He  points  out  that  the  aim  of  Wion's 
book  was  confessedly  the  glorification  of  the 
Benedictine  Order.  A  man  who  was  unscrupu- 
lous enough  to  fabricate  a  document  like  the 
so-called  prophecy  of  St.  Malachy,  would 
certainly  not  have  hesitated  to  give  special  pro- 
minence in  the  text  to  the  Benedictine  Popes, 
and  to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  they  had 
been  Benedictines.  Now,  in  this  prophecy, 
although  the  Dominican  Popes  are  noted  as 
Dominicans,  nothing  shows  the  least  Bene- 
dictine bias.  Again,  if  Wion  had  fabricated  the 
list  he  would  surely  have  made  it  accurate  up 
to  date,  and  have  supplied  interpretations  down 
to  the  time  at  which  the  list  was  printed  and 
given  to  the  world.  But  this  is  not  the  case.  The 
interpretations  stop  with  Urban  VII,  who  died 
in  1590.  The  Lignum  Vitce  of  Wion  appeared 
in  1595,  and  in  the  interval  three  Popes  had 
succeeded — Gregory  XIV,  Innocent  IX,  Clement 
VIII,  none  of  whom  can  be  said  in  any  way  to 
fit  their  mottoes.  A  forger  would  certainly  have 
managed  better. 

Professor  Harnack  accordingly  reverts  to  the 
theory  suggested  long  ago  by  F.  Menestrier,  the 
first  critic  who  satisfactorily  demolished  the  pro- 
phecies of  pseudo-Malachy,  and  since  then 
endorsed  by  Dollinger.  He  considers  that  the 
fabrication  had  its  origin  during  the  long  sede 
vacante  which  preceded  the  election  of  Gregory 


Theory  of  Harnack  153 

XIV  in  1590,  and  that  it  was  devised  in  the  ) 
interest  of  the  senior  of  the  College  of  Cardinals, 
Cardinal  Simoncelli,  Bishop  of  Orvieto,  who 
was  plainly  designated  by  the  motto  assigned 
to  the  Pope  next  in  order — Ex  antiquitate  urbis, 
Orvieto  being  etymologically,  as  every  man  of 
any  little  education  would  have  known,  Urbs 
vetus,  the  old  city.  In  support  of  this  theory, 
Professor  Harnack  appeals  strongly  and  forcibly 
to  the  fact  pointed  out  above,  that  in  the  whole 
long  list  of  mottoes  up  to  that  date  the  desig- 
nations are  entirely  derived  from  circumstances 
of  the  life  of  each  Pontiff  previous  to  his  election. 
It  was  the  forger's  object,  he  thinks,  to  show 
that  the  prophecies  were  always  taken  from 
something  which  belonged  to  him  as  Cardinal.1 

Let  me  point  out,  however,  that  this  argument, 
specious  as  it  may  appear,  is  not  wholly  convinc- 
ing. The  fact  that  the  mottoes  were  elaborated 
out  of  Panvinio,  sufficiently  explains  why  they 
are  confined  wholly  to  the  circumstances  of  each 
Pope's  life  before  his  election.  Panvinio,  as 
already  explained,  said  nothing  about  the  actual 
Papacy,  but  only  of  the  Pope's  antecedents,  and 
the  forger  who  used  Panvinio  naturally  confined 
himself  to  what  he  found  in  the  book  before  him. 

1  Gb'rres,  writing  in  the  Zeitschrift  f.  wissenschaftl.  Theologie 
(1903,  pp.  553-62)  on  "  Die  angebliche  Prophezeiung  des  hi. 
Malachias,"  contends  that  the  forgery  of  the  mottoes  was  a 
political  move  carried  out  in  1590,  a  time  when  party  feeling 
between  the  Spanish  and  French  factions  in  the  Conclave  ran 
very  high.  The  arguments,  however,  which  are  adduced  in 
support  of  this  view  seem  to  me  quite  unconvincing. 


1 54        Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

Without  further  discussion,  then,  I  may  con- 
tent myself  with  indicating  my  own  conclusion 
that  the  fabrication  of  the  prophecy  had  nothing 
to  do  with  the  conclave  of  1590,  but  must  be 
assigned  to  the  three  or  four  last  years  of  the 
life  of  Sixtus  V.  There  can  be  no  question  that 
Simoncelli,  in  1590,  was  an  absolutely  impos- 
sible candidate.  We  have  a  number  of  different 
accounts  of  the  famous  conclave  which  finally 
resulted  in  the  election  of  Gregory  XIV,  but  in 
no  one  of  these  that  I  have  seen  is  there  the 
slightest  allusion  to  Simoncelli  as  a  possible 
occupant  of  the  Papal  Chair.  What  motive 
could  a  man  have  for  fabricating  so  elaborate  a 
prophecy,  which  he  must  have  known  with 
absolute  certainty  would  be  falsified  in  a  few 
weeks'  time.  Again,  there  is  no  mention  of  any 
party  who  supported  the  interests  of  Simoncelli, 
no  hint  of  any  ruse  by  which  a  prophecy  was 
brought  into  play  to  influence  the  voting.1  The 
whole  struggle  lay  between  the  Spanish  faction 
and  the  party  identified  with  the  policy  of  Sixtus 
V,  led  by  his  nephew,  Cardinal  Montalto.  Even 
two  or  three  years  earlier,  when  Simoncelli  was 

1  A  considerable  number  of  "  Relations  "  of  the  events  of 
this  conclave  are  to  be  found  amongst  the  MSS.  of  the  British 
Museum.  Most  of  these  are  repetitions  of  the  account  given  in 
the  Histoire  des  Conclaves,  but  not  all.  Then  there  is  the 
narrative  of  Germonius,  printed  in  the  Monumenta  Histories 
Patrice,  and  the  Diario  of  the  Master  of  Ceremonies,  Aleoni. 
Not  one  of  these  says  a  word  of  Simoncelli  as  a  possible  Pope, 
much  less  speaks  of  any  prophecy  being  used  to  advance  his 
candidature. 


Harnack's  Theory  rejected        155 

less  old  and  decrepit,  there  was  no  talk  of  him 
as  a  likely  Pope.  In  MS.  Additional,  28,463, 
there  is  an  interesting  discorso  on  the  chances 
of  the  various  Roman  Cardinals,  in  July,  1589, 
less  than  a  year  before  the  death  of  Sixtus  V. 
Simoncelli  is  not  even  mentioned  as  papabile. 
Castagna,  who,  according  to  a  contemporary 
account,  was  recommended  to  the  Cardinals  by 
Sixtus,  on  his  death-bed,1  and  Mondovi  (Laureo) 
are  regarded  as  the  most  probable  candidates. 
Sfondrato  is  also  described  as  "  running  very 
near  the  Papacy."  He  succeeded  as  Gregory 
XIV  after  the  short  pontificate  of  Urban  VII 
(Castagna),  but  is  objected  to  by  the  author  of 
the  memorandum  on  the  ground  that  he  wore  a 
perpetual  smile,  which  many  people  found 
irritating. 

If,  therefore,  Simoncelli  was  really  designated 
by  the  motto  ex  antiquitate  urbis,  this  could  only 
have  been  when  the  possibilities  of  the  future 
seemed  remote  and  ill  defined.  And  this  appears 
to  agree  with  the  intrinsic  probabilities  of  the 
case.  It  seems  almost  obvious  that  any  forger 
who  took  the  trouble  to  fabricate  such  a  docu- 
ment would  not  be  content  to  look  only  to  the 
immediate  future  of  the  time  at  which  he  was 
writing,  and  make  a  guess  at  a  single  Pope,  but 
that  he  would  foresee  the  possibility  of  a  short 

1  MS.  Add.  21,382,  fol.  1403.  The  same  MS.  contains  a 
sonnet  on  the  conclave  held  on  the  death  of  Sixtus  V.  All  the 
prominent  Cardinals  are  introduced,  but  not  Simoncelli. 


156  Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 
reign,  or  a  series  of  short  reigns,  and  would 
indicate  two  or  three  among  existing  Cardinals 
as  likely  to  succeed  in  course  of  time,  perhaps 
even  picking  out  a  few  distinguished  young 
men,  not  yet  Cardinals,  whom  he  thought  likely 
to  be  raised  to  the  purple  and  to  become  Pope 
some  day.  This  is  in  fact  what  I  believe  to 
have  happened  in  the  present  case.  The  list  was 
perhaps  fabricated  about  1585,  shortly  after  the 
accession  of  Sixtus  V,  and  the  forger — I  am 
inclined  to  guess  that  Ciacconius  himself  may 
have  fabricated  it  as  a  hoax  and  jeu  d'esprit — 
set  down  the  following  mottoes  as  indicating  a 
likely  series  of  Pontiffs  among  the  men  he  knew 
then  living  in  Rome  : 

Motto  Persons  designated. 

De  Rore  Cceli.  Castagna  (or  perhaps  Mondovi). 

Exantiquitateurbis.  Simoncelli  (Laureo). 

Pia  civitas  in  bello.  Bellarmine  (not  then  Cardinal). 

Crux  Romulea.  Santacroce. 

Undosus  vir.  Baronius  (not  then  Cardinal). 

Pia  civitas  in  bello  seems  to  me  to  designate 
Bellarmine  in  a  most  marked  and  obvious  way, 
looking  always  to  the  principles  on  which  the 
early  prophecies  were  formed.  The  Pia  civitas 
was  Montepulciano — the  shrine  of  a  saint,  the 
birthplace  of  a  saintly  Pontiff  whose  memory 
was  still  green  (Pope  Marcellus  II,  who  was 
Bellarmine's  uncle) — and  itself  almost  proverbial 
for  the  good  lives  of  its  citizens. 

Crux  Romulea  would  fit  no  one  so  well  as  a 


Baronius  157 

member  of  the  Roman  family  of  Santa  Croce. 
Cardinal  Santa  Croce,  who  was  looked  upon  at 
the  beginning  of  Sixtus  V's  reign  as  a  most  able 
man,  died,  however,  in  1588.  It  is  just  possible 
that  a  nephew  of  his,  who  was  then  living  in 
Rome,  may  have  been  regarded  by  the  compiler 
as  likely  to  be  made  Cardinal  some  day,  and 
finally  Pope.1 


ARMS  OF  CARDINAL  BARONIUS.       UndoSUS  Vtr  (  ?). 

Undosus  vir,  again,  was  Baronius,  whose 
arms  are  depicted  above.  The  pens  and  cross 
were  presumably  added  when  he  became  Car- 
dinal. The  waves  in  the  family  arms  beneath 
would  have  suggested  the  undosus,  just  as  the 

1   In  the  Ragguaglio  della  Cavalcata  de  N.  S.  Gregorio  XIJII 
(1590),   by   F.   Albertorio,    among   the  signori  caporioni  "  gor- 

feously    dressed    and    wearing    swords,"    is    named    Marcello 
antacroce. 


158         Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

arms  of  Boniface  VIII  suggested  the  motto  ex 
undarum  benedictione. 

When  also  we  remember  that  varon  or  baron 
is  the  Spanish  for  man  (vir\  it  is  easy  to  under- 
stand how  a  Spaniard  like  Ciacconius  might 
have  thought  that  Baronius  would  be  excellently 
indicated  by  the  phrase  Undosus  vir. 

Of  course  the  point  which  in  all  this  discus- 
sion most  needs  to  be  insisted  on  is  the  fact  that 
the  mottoes  of  pseudo-Malachy  must  necessarily 
be  treated  as  one  document.  It  is  impossible  to 
reject  the  first  seventy  as  a  barefaced  imposture 
and  to  consider  the  thirty  or  forty  that  remain, 
or  any  part  of  them,  as  divinely  inspired.  The 
difference  between  the  two  sets  is  that  the  forger 
in  passing  from  the  region  of  the  known  to  the 
future  and  unknown,  deals  more  and  more,  as 
Dollinger  says,  "  in  meaningless  unintelligible 
phrases  and  commonplaces."  It  may  be  worth 
while  to  copy  here  the  whole  of  the  remaining 
list  from  Crux  de  cruce,  identified  with  Pius 
IX,  down  to  the  end.  I  simply  print  Wion's 
text  with  Lord  Bute's  translation  : 

101.  Crux  de  cruce.  The  cross  from  a  cross. 

102.  Lumen  in  coelo.  A  light  in  the  sky. 

103.  Ignis  ardens.  Burning  fire. 

104.  Religio  depopulata.  Monasticism      plundered 

(or  religion  laid  waste). 

105.  Fides  intrepida.  Faith  undaunted. 

106.  Pastor  angelicus.  An  angelic  shepherd. 

107.  Pastor  et  nauta.  A  Shepherd  and  a  sailor. 

108.  Flos  florum.  A  flower  of  flowers. 


Mottoes  still  outstanding          159 

109.   De  medietate  lunae.  From  an  half  moon, 

no.   De  labore  soils.  From  the  toil  of  the  sun. 

in.   Gloria  oliva?.  The  glory  of  the  olive. 

In  persecutione  extrema  During  the  last  perse- 

Sacrae  Romana?  Ecclesia-  cution  of  the  Holy  Roman 

sedebit  Petrus   Romanus  Church  there  shall  sit  the 

qui  pascet  oves  in  multis  Roman  Peter,  who  shall 

tribulationibus,        quibus  fe5d  the  sheep  amid  great 

transactis,   civitas   septi-  tribulations,     and     when 

collis    diruetur    et   Judex  these  are  passed  the  City 

tremendusjudicabitpopu-  of   Seven   Hills   shall  be 

lum.  utterly  destroyed  and  the 

awful    Judge    will    judge 

the  people. 

It  is  curious  that  these  last  words,  if  I  rightly 
understand  a  remark  of  Wion's,  do  not  belong  to 
the  original  supposed  prophecy  of  Malachy,  but 
are  an  addition  by  Ciacconius.  How  completely 
Delphic  in  their  uncertainty  and  consequently  how 
much  worse  than  useless  these  utterances  are  for 
any  purpose  of  practical  guidance,  may  be  illus- 
trated by  a  passage  from  a  prophecy  book,  The 
Christian  Trumpet,  printed  in  England  in  1875. 
At  that  date,  of  course,  Pius  IX  still  occupied  the 
chair  of  St.  Peter,  and  the  writer  remarks  re- 
garding the  time  to  come  : 

According  to  St.  Malachy,  then,  only  ten,  or  at 
most  eleven,  Popes,  remain  to  be  in  future  more  or 
less  legitimately  elected. 

We  say  more  or  less  legitimately  elected,  because 
out  of  those  future  Popes  it  is  to  be  feared  that  one 
or  two  will  be  unlawfully  elected  as  Antipope.  It 
is  suspected  that  the  one  designated  as  Ignis  ardens 


1 60        Prophecy  of  St.  Malachy 

(Burning  fire)  shall  be  the  first  Antipope,  who  will 
be  unlawfully  elected  in  opposition  to  Lumen  in 
Ccelo  (Light  in  the  heaven) — the  legitimate  successor 
of  the  present  Pope.  Besides  some  predictions 
announcing  the  deplorable  event,  many  powerful  and 
influential  persons  in  Europe  are  at  present  agreed 
and  determined  to  use  all  their  efforts  to  elect  an 
Antipope  in  order  to  produce  a  schism  in  the  Church 
and  to  have  a  man  who  will  favour  their  impious 
designs  against  the  Catholic  religion.1 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Abbe*  Joseph  Maitre, 
who  in  two  huge  volumes  has  constituted  him- 
self the  champion  of  the  authenticity  of  the 
Malachy  prophecy,  holds  that  the  motto  ignis 
ardens  "  may  either  symbolize  the  zeal  and 
charity  of  the  Pontiff  to  be  elected,  or  may  de- 
pict the  violence  of  the  sufferings  and  trials  he  is 
to  endure,  perhaps  from  a  terrible  war,  perhaps 
from  a  general  conflagration  or  cataclysm  in  the 
moral  or  physical  order. ' "  Again,  M .  L '  Abb£  Cha- 
bauty  inclines  to  the  view  that  the  Pope  desig- 
nated by  Ignis  ardens  must  be  destined  "  to  set 
on  foot  and  carry  to  completion  the  conversion 
of  the  entire  world,  so  that  under  him  we  shall 
see  the  realization  of  the  promise  of  '  one  fold 
and  one  shepherd.'  '  "  I  infer  this,"  adds  the 
Abbe,  "  not  to  quote  other  proofs  ( !),  from  the 
text,  '  I  have  come  to  cast  fire  upon  the  earth 
and,  what  will  I  but  that  it  be  kindled.'  "  The 

1  The  Christian  Trumpet  (London,  1875),  p.  203. 
*  Maitre,  Les  Papes  et  la  Papantd  d'apres  la  Prophetic  attri- 
bute a  St.  Malachie  (Paris,  1902),  p.  737. 


Malachy  improved  upon          161 

same  critic  concludes  that  religio  depopulate. 
represents  an  anti-Pope.1 

Could  we  ask  for  better  proof  of  the  futility  of 
such  prophecies,  for  all  purposes  of  instruction 
or  even  edification,  than  this  divergence  of 
opinion  among  the  most  thoroughgoing  de- 
fenders of  the  Pope-mottoes  ? 

Lastly,  I  may  draw  attention,  if  only  for  the 
sake  of  completeness,  to  a  development  of  the 
Malachy  oracles  to  which  publicity  has  been 
given  of  recent  years.  Here  the  names  of  the 
next  few  Popes  profess  to  be  disclosed,  and  the 
statement  has  been  made  that  the  text  was 
printed  in  1899.  This  assertion  it  is  out  of  my 
power  to  verify.  If  it  were  true,  it  would  be  a 
remarkable  fact,  for  the  Pope  corresponding  to 
Ignis  ardens  is  correctly  designated  as  Pius  X. 
But  even  if  the  prophet  was  successful  in  his 
first  venture,  he  has  come  sadly  to  grief  in  his 
second  interpretation,  as  he  assigns  to  religio 
depopulata  the  name  of  Paul  VI. a  After  that  we 
can  feel  little  interest  in  learning  from  him  that 
Pius  XI  and  Gregory  XVII  come  next  in  order, 
and  that  the  former  of  these  after  a  glorious 
victory  will  become  King  of  Italy. 

1  E.  A.  Chabauty,  Lettres  sur  les  Propheties  modernes  (2nd 
ed.,  Paris,  1872),  pp.  219-20. 

3  C.  Niccoulaud,  Nostradamus,  ses  Propheties,  Paris,  1914. 
M.  Niccoulaud  quotes  for  these  facts  La  Revue  Internationale 
des  Societes  secretes,  August  5th,  1913,  p.  2741. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  FATE  OF  ENGLAND  AND  THE  COMING  OF 
ANTICHRIST 

I  PROPOSE  to  conclude  these  somewhat 
desultory  chapters  by  speaking  briefly  of 
the  two  subjects  in  which  prophets  and 
soothsayers    since    mediaeval    times   have 
found  their  principal  inspiration,  to  wit 
the  destiny   of  their  own   native  land  and  the 
near  approach   of  the  end  of   the  world.      To 
discuss  these  themes  in  any  great  detail  does 
not   seem   needful;   for   here,    more   than    any- 
where   else,    all    verification    being    indefinitely 
remote,  extravagance  and  incoherence  are  parti- 
cularly likely  to  prevail.     But  it  would  argue  a 
certain  incompleteness  in  this  survey  of  modern 
prophetic  books,   if  these  topics  which  are  apt 
to  occupy  so  much  space  in  their  pages  were 
passed  over  entirely  without  comment. 

For  the  past  history  of  "  national  prophecies,1' 
as  they  have  been  called,  I  can  only  advise  the 
reader  to  consult  the  third  chapter  of  Bellinger's 
essay.  The  subject  is  too  extensive  to  admit  of 
my  summarizing  it  here.  Neither  will  space 
allow  us  to  busy  ourselves  with  foreign  countries 

i6z 


Folk  prophecies  in  Ireland        163 

and  with  the  beliefs  regarding  the  future  which 
in  their  case  have  often  grown  out  of  deeply- 
rooted  popular  traditions.  Of  this  species  of 
folklore  little  probably  now  survives  in  England ; 
although  in  the  sister  Isle,  Professor  O 'Curry, 
half  a  century  ago,  wrote  pathetically  of  the 
prevalence  of  such  predictions. 

"  I  have  myself  known,"  he  said,  "hundreds  of 
people,  some  highly  educated  men  and  women 
amongst  them,  who  have  often  neglected  to  attend 
to  their  worldly  advancement,  in  expectation  that  the 
false  promises  of  these  so-called  prophecies — many 
of  them  gross  forgeries  of  our  own  day — would  in 
some  never  accurately  specified  time  bring  about  such 
changes  in  the  state  of  the  country  as  must  restore  it 
to  its  ancient  condition.  And  the  believers  in  these 
idle  dreams  were  but  too  sure  to  sit  down  and  wait 
for  the  coming  of  the  golden  age ;  as  if  it  were  fated 
to  overtake  them  without  the  slightest  effort  of  their 
own  to  attain  happiness  or  independence. "] 

In  England,  as  just  remarked,  there  has  been 
comparatively  little  of  this,  especially  in  recent 
times,  but  as  the  British  Empire  plays  a  part  of 
some  importance  in  the  drama  of  the  world,  any 
dearth  of  native  prophets  has  been  compensated 
for  by  the  interest  which  the  seers  of  other 
countries  have  taken  in  the  destinies  of  perfidious 
Albion. 

Something  has  already  been  said  of  one  or 
two  prognostics  of  the  French  astrologer 

1  Eugene  O 'Curry,  Lectures  on  the  Manuscript  Materials  of 
Ancient  Irish  History  (Dublin,  1878),  p.  431. 


1 64  The  Fate  of  England 

Nostradamus  regarding  London  in  the  seven- 
teenth century,  and,  indeed,  there  are  many 
others,  hardly  less  curious,  which  might  have 
been  cited  from  the  same  source.  But  I  will 
content  myself  now  with  reproducing  one  other 
quatrain  which,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  it  was 
printed  a  good  twenty  years  before  the  defeat  of 
the  Spanish  Armada,  must  certainly  be  counted 
a  remarkable  utterance.  The  words  of  Nostra- 
damus are  these  : 

Le  grand  Empire  sera  par  1'Angleterre 
Le  Pempotam1  des  ans  plus  de  trois  cens, 
Grandes  copies  passer  par  mer  et  terre ; 
Les  Lusitains  n'en  seront  pas  contens." 

A  seventeenth  century  English  version 
translated  it  thus  : 

England  of  Empire  shall  be  long  the  seat, 
More  than  three  hundred  years  continuing  great. 
Large  forces  thence  shall  pass  through  lands  and  seas 
To  the  disquiet  of  the  Portuguese. 

Is  this  to  be  understood  as  a  prophecy  of  the 
maritime  dominion  of  England  ?  Portugal 
certainly  was  the  great  naval  power  in  the  East 
Indies  at  the  time  when  this  was  written,  and  it 
was  the  Portuguese  rather  than  the  Spaniards 
that  England  was  destined  to  supplant.  At  the 
same  time  it  is  very  doubtful  whether  we  have 
anything  more  here  than  a  masterpiece  of 

1  A  dreadful  hybrid  word  which  seems  to  be  derived  from  irav 
potens  =  a\\  powerful. 
3  Century,    x,    100. 


Rule  Britannia  Foreshadowed       165 

Delphic  ambiguity.  Sea  power,  after  all,  is  not 
directly  mentioned.  Moreover,  if  it  had  chanced 
that  France  had  conquered  England,  and  by 
means  of  that  conquest  (par  VAngleterre)  had 
acquired  an  overseas  empire,  the  prognostic 
would  have  seemed  to  be  even  more  strikingly 
fulfilled  than  it  is  now.  Undoubtedly  the  un- 
rivalled success  of  Nostradamus's  oracles  is  due 
to  the  fact  that  avoiding  all  orderly  arrangement 
either  chronological  or  topographical,  and  re- 
fraining almost  entirely  from  categoric  state- 
ments, it  is  impossible  ever  to  say  that  a  parti- 
cular prognostic  has  missed  its  mark,  while 
amongst  the  multitude  of  political  occurrences 
vaguely  outlined,  some  quite  startling  coinci- 
dences are  sure  to  be  observed  in  the  course  of 
years.  In  other  words,  Nostradamus  provides  an 
ingenious  system  of  divination  in  which  the 
misses  can  never  be  recorded  and  only  the  hits 
come  to  the  surface.  For  the  reputation  of  the 
would-be  prophet  such  conditions  are  naturally 
ideal. 

Except  for  the  implied  limitation  of  England's 
maritime  dominion  to  300  years,  this  prognostic 
of  Nostradamus  is  distinctly  favourable.  Other 
foreign  prophecies  regarding  the  destiny  of 
Britain  are  not  so  encouraging.  For  example, 
the  Pere  Nectou,  who  had  been  a  Jesuit  and 
Provincial  of  Aquitaine  before  the  suppression 
of  the  Society,  was  supposed  to  have  made  many 
remarkable  prophecies  towards  the  close  of  the 


1 66  The  Fate  of  England 

eighteenth  century.  Some  of  these,  referring  to 
individuals,  are  said  to  have  been  fulfilled  in  a 
most  surprising  way.  In  dealing  with  public 
events  he  does  not  seem  to  have  been  so  success- 
ful ;  at  any  rate,  fulfilment  has  so  far  been 
delayed.  Thus  we  are  told  that  he  predicted  a 
second  revolution  in  his  native  country,  adding 
that: 

During  this  revolution,  which  will  very  likely  be 
general  and  not  confined  to  France,  Paris  will  be 
destroyed  so  completely  that  twenty  years  afterwards 
fathers,  walking  over  its  ruins  with  their  children, 
the  children  will  inquire  what  place  that  was.  To 
whom  they  will  answer:  ''My  child,  this  was 
formerly  a  great  city  which  God  has  destroyed  on 
account  of  its  crimes."1 

It  may  be,  however,  that  the  appointed  hour 
has  not  yet  arrived,  for  the  Pere  Nectou  went 
on  :  "As  when  the  fig-tree  begins  to  sprout  and 
produces  leaves,  it  is  a  certain  sign  that  the 
summer  is  near,  so  when  England  shall  begin 
to  wane  in  power,  the  destruction  of  Paris  will 
be  near  at  hand." 

This  shall  be  as  a  sign.  England  shall,  in  her  turn, 
experience  a  more  frightful  revolution  than  that  of 
France.  It  shall  continue  so  long  as  to  give  time  to 
France  to  recover  her  strength,  and  then  she  will  help 
England  to  return  to  order  and  peace.* 

The  Revolution  which  is  to  be  the  downfall  of 
England's  greatness  has  long  been  a  rather 

1   Voix  Prophdtiques,  5th  ed.,  vol.  ii,  p.  239. 
3  U>->  P-  249. 


Mile.  Couedon  167 

favourite  theme  with  the  seers  of  the  Continent, 
particularly  in  Germany.  For  example,  here  is 
a  summary  estimate  of  the  fate  of  England  found 
in  a  Catholic  work,  already  referred  to,  printed 
thirty  or  forty  years  back,  and  known  as  Das 
Buck  der  Wahr — und  Weissagungen.  It  has 
gone  through  more  than  one  edition. 

England  has  caused  much  mischief  in  Germany  and 
other  countries,  and  has  put  upon  them  many  an 
insult.  She  will  continue  through  intrigues  and 
bribery  of  all  kinds  to  frustrate  all  efforts  at  reforma- 
tion. Ireland  will  rise  in  revolt  and  come  victoriously 
out  of  the  contest.  England's  star  is  on  the  wane, 
and  it  is  only  by  perpetual  trickery  that  this  nation 
of  shopkeepers  is  preserved  for  a  short  time  from 
utter  ruin. 

The  edition  from  which  I  quote  this  was 
printed  in  1884. l 

Again  a  certain  Mile.  Couedon,  who  was 
much  consulted  as  an  oracle  in  Paris,  found  her- 
self inspired,  at  the  time  of  Queen  Victoria's 
second  Tubilee,  to  deliver  some  most  startling 
prophecies  regarding  the  future  of  Great  Britain. 
She  announced,  amongst  other  things,  the 
restoration  of  the  Stuarts  : 

L'Angleterre  sera  changed 
Je  la  vois  de'membre'e ; 
Une  famille  qui  a  regne* 
Et  qu'on  a  emp^che'e, 

1  Das  Buck  der  Wahr — und  Weissagungen  (Regensburg, 
1884),  Appendix, 


1 68  The  Fate  of  England 

Je  la  vois  remonter ; 

Un  roi  du  passe", 

Lui  sera  donne*, 

Quand  ceux,  qui  ont  usurpe" 

Seront  de"tr6n6s.1 

Still  more  alarming  were  the  calamities  which 
Mile.  Coue'don  predicted  as  threatening  Eng- 
land's naval  supremacy  : 

Quant  au  jubile 
Pour  cette  Reine  il  faut  prier, 
Les  Anglais  vont  changer, 
Les  Indes  leur  seront  6te"es. 
Je  vois  la  guerre  de"clare"e. 
Je  vois  leur  flotte  de"cim£e, 
Je  la  vois  submerge'e ; 
II  n'en  va  pas  rester. 

If  anyone  were  disposed  to  take  these  oracles 
at  all  seriously,  he  might  find  consolation  in  the 
fact  that  while  Mile.  Coue'don  declared  that  a 
vast  European  conflict  would  break  out  in  the 
immediate  future,  she  also  predicted  that  France 
would  have  to  support  the  struggle  alone. 
Russia,  on  which  her  hopes  had  been  built, 
would  not  stir  a  finger  to  help  her. 

Ce  que  vous  avez  re"ve* 
II  n'y  faut  pas  compter. 

1  L'Echo  du  Merveilleux,  February  ist,  1897  :  "  Engtand  will 
be  changed  ;  I  see  her  dismembered  ;  a  family  which  reigned 
before  and  which  has  been  attainted,  I  see  it  restored.  A 
king  of  a  former  dynasty  will  be  given  to  her,  when  those  who 
usurped  their  power  will  be  dethroned." 


Bartholomew  Holzhauser         169 

Also  that  Paris  would  be  burnt  to  the  ground, 
and  that  without  delay. 

Le  feu  va  y  passer 
Et  cela  sans  tarder.1 

Despite  these  gloomy  forebodings  there  have 
been  not  a  few  among  those  who  believed  them- 
selves prophetically  inspired  who  have  written 
concerning  England  with  great  sympathy.  The 
most  famous  of  these  was  the  mystic 
Bartholomew  Holzhauser  in  the  time  of  the  early 
Stuarts. 

This  venerable  servant  of  God,  who  was  born 
of  humble  parents  in  1613  not  far  from  Augs- 
burg, was  the  founder  of  an  Institute  of  Secular 
Priests,  which  met  with  considerable  favour  in 
his  native  country.  He  was  a  man  of  remark- 
able piety,  and  was  held  by  many  of  his 
contemporaries  to  be  possessed  of  extraordinary 
prophetic  gifts.  Certain  visions  of  his  were 
written  down  by  him  and  collected  into  one 
manuscript  volume  towards  the  beginning  of  the 
year  1646.  In  these,  it  appears,  he  asserted  that 
England  would  fall  into  extreme  misery,  that 
the  King  would  be  slain,  and  that  afterwards  the 
Kingdom  of  England  would  return  to  the  ancient 

1  L'Echo  du  Merveilleux,  July  ist,  1897  :  "  As  for  the  Jubilee, 
we  must  pray  for  the  poor  Queen  ;  a  change  is  to  come  over 
England.  The  Indies  will  be  taken  from  them ;  I  see  war 
declared  ;  I  see  their  fleet  decimated  ;  I  see  it  sunk  ;  nothing  will 
be  left  of  it."  Cf.  Marquis  de  Guiry,  Mile.  Couedon  est  elle 
inspiree  de  Dieu?  (Paris,  1899) — a  question  which  the  author 
answers  in  the  affirmative  ! 


170  The  Fate  of  England 

Roman  faith,  and  the  English  achieve  more  for 
the  Church  than  on  their  first  conversion  to 
Christianity.  Among  the  friends  of  Holzhauser 
was  a  Jesuit,  Father  Lyprand,  who  after  his 
death  described  how  he  had  met  him  during  one 
of  his  visits  to  Ingolstadt,  and  as  a  report  had 
been  for  some  time  current  that  Charles  I  of 
England,  who  was  then  still  living,  was  likely 
to  become  a  Catholic,  Father  Lyprand  asked  the 
mystic  how  this  could  be  reconciled  with  his 
prophecy  about  England.  On  this  Holzhauser 
replied  in  a  very  confident  manner :  "  King 
Charles  of  England  is  neither  now  a  Catholic, 
nor  will  he  ever  become  a  Catholic.*'  "  The 
event,"  says  Father  Lyprand,  "proved  the 
truth  of  his  words.  At  the  same  time  he  in- 
formed me  that  he  knew  from  God  that  the 
Swede  would  never  have  a  footing  in  the  German 
Empire,  and  that  the  Rhine  would  return  to  its 
ancient  master." 

As  to  Bartholomew's  prophecies  in  general, 
Father  Lyprand  expresses  himself  with  caution. 
"I  have  always  been  of  opinion,"  he  wrote,  "that 
he  went  to  work  without  any  guile,  and  that  his 
natural  parts  were  inadequate  to  their  fabrica- 
tion .  .  .  but  although  I  hold  it  as  probable 
enough,  nay,  as  extremely  probable,  that 
Holzhauser  had  received  from  God  the  gift  of 
prophecy,  yet  I  would  not  venture  to  assert  that 
he  always  rightly  understood  the  prophecies 
communicated  to  him;  for  it  is  agreed  among 


Holzhauser  and  England  171 
theologians  that  the  first  gift  may  exist  without 
the  second."1 

It  appears  that  during  the  period  of  the 
travels,  Holzhauser  was  presented  to  him  at 
Geisenheim,  and  told  him  something  of  his 
visions,  recommending  to  His  Majesty's  pro- 
tection the  Catholic  religion  in  England  and  the 
priests  who  were  labouring  there.  The  King,  it 
is  stated,  gave  him  his  hand  and  promised  to  be 
mindful  of  his  request;  and  here  Holzhauser's 
biographer  remarks  : 

It  is  astonishing  with  what  a  burning  zeal  Holz- 
hauser laboured  to  bring  about  the  conversion  of 
England.  This  was  the  marrow  of  his  thoughts — 
the  subject  of  his  conversation — the  sum  of  all  his 
desires.  With  his  blood  he  would  fain  have  washed 
away,  had  he  been  permitted,  all  the  errors  of  heresy. 
No  resolution  was  so  fixedly  implanted  in  him,  as  to 
go  to  England,  and  there,  utterly  regardless  of  any 
risk  he  might  run  for  his  life,  make  a  beginning 
towards  a  restoration  of  the  Catholic  faith.  He 
awaited  only  the  Elector's  permission  to  prosecute 
this  voyage.  This  permission  he  would  have  sought 
with  earnest  prayers  had  he  not  been  overcome  by 
the  still  more  urgent  solicitations  of  his  friends, 
Giindel  and  Vogt,  and  been  induced  to  defer  for  one 
or  several  years  the  execution  of  a  project,  which  he 
never  would  entirely  give  up,  in  order,  in  the  first 
place,  to  consolidate  his  rising  Institute  until  such 
time  as  his  presence  might  be  more  easily  dispensed 

1  Gaduel,  Vie  de  Barihelemy  Holzhauser  (Paris,  1861),  9.369. 
The  letter  of  Father  Lyprand  was  written  in  1660.  The  text  is 
in  J.  D.  Gruber,  Prodromus,  pp.  792-8. 


172  The  Fate  of  England 

with.  It  was  with  difficulty  he  could  be  held  back 
from  this  project.1 

Perhaps  the  most  remarkable  passage  in  his 
visions  bearing  on  England  is  the  following  : 

I  stood  in  the  year  1635  by  the  Danube,  giving 
alms  to  the  banished,  and  offering  up  prayers  for  the 
whole  earth.  I  stood  towards  the  north  and  the  west, 
and  my  heart  poured  itself  out  in  many  lamentations 
before  God,  saying  :  "  How  long  will  the  adversary 
hold  this  kingdom  in  bondage,  which  swimmeth  with 
the  blood  of  martyrs,  spilled  by  that  accursed  woman 
Jezebel,  as  she  wished  to  reign  in  the  Church  of 
God?  "  And  I  heard  at  the  same  time  that  the 
lawful  sacrifice  would  be  intermitted  for  one  hundred 
and  twenty  years ;  and  on  the  other  side  of  the  sea  I 
saw  immense  lands,  and  how  peoples  and  tongues 
thronged  together,  and  how  the  land  was  inwardly 
shaken  by  armies,  as  by  an  earthquake.  The  pro- 
digious multitude  I  saw  divided,  and  I  beheld  the 
king  standing  in  the  midst.  And  it  was  told  me,  "All 
rests  with  the  king,  and  the  king  is,  as  it  were,  sold. " 

And  towards  the  west  the  heavens  were  opened, 
and  the  land  trembled  as  with  an  earthquake,  and  the 
nations  were  shaken,  and  terror  came  over  the  whole 
kingdom ;  and  it  was  told  me  :  "  On  the  king  depen- 
deth  the  salvation  of  the  people  !  "  And  it  seemed 
to  me  as  if  he  refused;  and  I  heard  :  "  If  the  king 
will  not,  then  will  he  be  smitten."  And  the  heavens 
again  opened  towards  the  west ;  a  large,  fiery  ball 
came  down,  flew  oblique,  and  smote  the  king.  And 
now  his  kingdom  rested  in  peace,  and  the  land  was 
illuminated. 

1  L.  Clarus,  Bartholotnceus  Holzhauser ;  Lebensgeschichte,  p. 
69. 


Intermission  of  the  Mass          173 

And  lo  !  I  saw  a  ship  sailing  on  the  sea,  and  arrive 
in  port,  and  righteous  and  holy  men,  who  were  in 
the  ship,  landed,  and  they  began  to  preach  the  Gospel 
in  those  countries.  They  prospered  in  their  under- 
taking;  and  that  land  returned  to  peace  and  to  the 
sanctification  of  Jesus  Christ.1 

That  the  Holy  Sacrifice  should  be  intermitted 
for  1 20  years  does  not  seem  to  me,  as  it  appar- 
ently seemed  to  the  writer  of  the  article  in  the 
Dublin  Review,  from  which  I  quote  it,  a  re- 
markably happy  hit.  In  one  quite  true  sense, 
that  of  actual  fact,  the  offering  up  of  the  Mass 
was  never  interrupted  in  England.  If,  on  the 
other  hand,  we  take  account  of  the  period  of  the 
legal  prohibition,  the  penal  statutes  which 
rendered  the  saying  of  Mass  a  criminal  offence, 
were  in  force  for  within  a  few  years  of  two  cen- 
turies. Neither  has  the  "  landing  of  holy  men  " 
in  England — by  which  we  are  no  doubt  meant  to 
understand  the  clergy  of  France  exiled  at  the 
Revolution,  together  with  the  younger  religious 
Orders,  such  as  the  Passionists  and  the  Redemp- 
torists — brought  us  perceptibly  nearer  the  con- 
version of  the  nation  as  a  whole.  But  amid  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  Oxford  movement  and  the 
restoration  of  the  Catholic  hierarchy,  there  must 
have  been  many  to  whom  the  return  of  England 
to  the  faith  seemed  very  near.  It  was  this 
expectation  which  no  doubt  led  some  amongst 
them  to  attach  a  new  meaning  to  the  prophecy 

1  Translated  in  the  Dublin  Review,  September,  1850,  p.  133. 


1 74  The  Fate  of  England 

of  St.  Edward  the  Confessor.  That  monarch  a 
few  hours  before  he  passed  away  was  super- 
naturally  visited,  as  he  believed,  by  two  holy 
monks  whom  he  had  known  in  his  youth. 
Appearing  to  him  in  a  vision,  they  denounced 
the  grievous  corruptions  of  the  Church  and 
State,  and  warned  him  that  on  this  account  God 
had  laid  a  curse  upon  the  realm  of  England. 
The  King,  after  vainly  enquiring  whether  this 
sentence  could  in  any  way  be  averted,  finally 
asked  how  long  the  curse  should  last.  To  which 
they  replied  : 

In  that  day  when  a  green  tree  shall  be  cut  away 
from  the  midst  of  its  trunk,  when  it  shall  be  carried 
away  for  the  space  of  three  furlongs  from  its  root, 
when  without  the  help  of  man  it  shall  join  itself  again 
to  its  trunk  and  shall  again  put  forth  leaves  and  bear 
fruit  in  its  season — then  first  shall  be  the  time  when 
the  woes  of  England  shall  come  to  an  end.1 

Contemporary  evidence  makes  it  practically 
certain  that  St.  Edward  on  his  death-bed  did 
narrate  some  such  vision  to  those  who  stood 
round;  and  in  the  twelfth  century  Englishmen 
commonly  interpreted  the  prophecy  as  fore- 
shadowing the  restoration  of  the  old  Saxon  line 
by  the  marriage  of  Henry  I  with  Eadgyth  or 
Matilda,  after  continuity  had  been  broken  for 
three  generations  by  the  intrusion  of  the 
usurpers  Harold,  William  the  Conqueror,  and 
William  Rufus.  But  the  enthusiasts  of  the 

1  Freeman,  Norman  Conquest,  vol.  iii,  p.  n. 


The  Antichrist  Legend  175 

"  Second  Spring "  attached  quite  a  different 
meaning  to  the  prediction.  The  curse  in  their 
opinion  was  to  last  not  for  three  reigns,  but  for 
three  centuries,  during  which  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land, by  the  act  of  Henry  VIII  and  his  daughter 
Elizabeth,  should  be  severed  from  the  true  vine, 
the  parent  trunk  of  Rome.  Only  then  would 
the  curse  be  removed  when,  without  the  help  of 
man,  the  bough  should  again  be  united  to  its 
root  through  the  submission  of  England  to  the 
Holy  See. 

Turning  now  to  the  anticipation  of  the  coming 
of  Antichrist  and  the  end  of  the  world,  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that  this  topic,  remaining  substantially 
the  same  under  an  infinite  variety  of  forms,  has 
attracted  the  deep  interest  of  Christians  since  the 
time  of  the  Apostles.  It  is  not  my  intention 
here  to  discuss  the  matter  historically  or  to 
attempt  to  disentangle  the  extremely  complicated 
story  of  the  Antichrist  legend.  The  investiga^ 
tion  has  been  carried  out  very  systematically  by 
such  scholars  as  Zezschwitz,  Bousset,  R.  H. 
Charles,  and  others.  Let  it  be  sufficient  to 
recognize  the  fact  that  some  elements  of  the  myth 
go  back  to  pre-Christian  times,  while  others  are 
derived  from  the  canonical  scriptures  (notably 
from  the  Epistles  of  St.  Paul  to  the  Thes- 
salonians,  the  First  Epistle  of  St.  John,  and  the 
Apocalypse),  and  others  again  from  the 
Apocrypha  of  the  New  Testament.  Among 
these  last  we  may  reckon  the  document  com- 


176          The  coming  of  Antichrist 

monly  known  as  the  Ascension  of  Isaiah,  which 
Dr.  Charles  considers  can  be  analysed  into  three 
more  primitive  components,  one  of  them  being 
what  he  calls  "  the  Testament  of  Hezekiah,"  and 
dating,  as  he  believes,  from  the  actual  time  of 
the  Apostles  ("between  88  and  100  A.D.").1 
Whatever  view  we  may  hold  of  the  genesis  of 
the  Ascension,  the  passage  concerning  the  near 
approach  of  the  end  of  the  world  is  of  remarkable 
interest.  Here  an  Antichrist  is  introduced, 
though  he  is  not  called  by  that  name,  who  is 
really  Satan  incarnate,  clothed  in  the  likeness  of 
the  Emperor  Nero,  "  the  slayer  of  his  mother," 
into  whose  hands  also  the  Apostle  St.  Peter  was 
delivered.2  The  name  Beliar  (=  the  Belial  of 
2  Cor.  vi.  15)  is  used  simply  as  a  personal  name 
for  Satan-Antichrist. 

The  prominence  here  given  to  the  Emperor 
Nero  as  a  sort  of  type  of  Antichrist  is  in  full 
accord  with  the  most  probable  interpretation  of 
the  verse  of  the  Apocalypse  concerning  the 
number  of  the  beast.  "  He  that  hath  under- 
standing let  him  count  the  number  of  the  beast. 
For  it  is  the  number  of  a  man  :  and  the  number  of 
him  is  six  hundred  and  sixty  and  six  "  (Apoc. 
xiii.  1 8).  Now  the  words  NERO  C^SAR,  written 
in  Aramaic,  contain  letters,  the  numerical 
values  of  which  amount  to  666,  and  what  is  even 

1  Professor  Burkitt  in  his  Schweich  lecture  on  Jewish  and 
Christian  Apocalypses,  p.  45,  protests  against  this  dissection. 

3  It  seems  that  at  this  very  early  date  St.  Paul  had  not  yet 
commonly  come  to  be  counted  among  the  twelve  Apostles. 


Nero  or  Beliar  ?  177 

more  significant,  another  spelling  of  the  same 
words  would  yield  the  total  616,  which  happens 
to  be  a  variant  reading  found  in  some  early 
manuscripts  of  the  Apocalypse.  It  is  also  cer- 
tain from  such  early  Christian  documents  as  the 
Epistle  of  Barnabas  that  considerable  attention 
was  paid  to  the  numerical  equivalent  of  the 
letters  of  proper  names.  Also  it  may  be  noticed 
that  the  whole  extract  from  the  Ascension  of 
Isaiah  is  very  similar  in  spirit  to  the  Gog  and 
Magog  passage  in  the  Apocalypse  (xx.  7-10), 
while  the  duration  of  the  rule  of  Beliar  is,  no 
doubt,  suggested  by  Dan.  vii.  25,  and  xii.  n. 

And  now  Hezekiah  and  Josab,  my  son,  these  are 
the  days  of  the  completion  of  the  world.  After  it  is 
consummated,  Beliar,  the  great  ruler,  the  king  of  this 
world,  will  descend,  who  hath  ruled  it  since  it  came 
into  being- ;  yea,  he  will  descend  from  his  firmament 
in  the  likeness  of  a  man,  a  lawless  king,  the  slayer  of 
his  mother,  who  himself  will  persecute  the  plant 
which  the  twelve  Apostles  of  the  Beloved  have 
planted.  Of  the  twelve,  one  (i.e.,  St.  Peter)  will  be 
delivered  into  his  hands.  This  ruler  in  the  form  of 
that  king  will  come,  and  there  will  come  with  him  all 
the  powers  of  this  world,  and  they  will  hearken  unto 
him  in  all  that  he  desires.  And  at  his  word  the  sun 
will  rise  at  night  and  he  will  make  the  moon  to  appear 
at  the  sixth  hour.  And  all  that  he  hath  desired  he 
will  do  in  the  world.  He  will  do  and  speak  like  the 
Beloved  and  he  will  say  :  "  I  am  God,  and  before  me 
there  has  been  none."  And  all  the  people  in  the 
world  will  believe  in  him,  and  they  will  sacrifice  to 


178          The  coming  of  Antichrist 

him  and  they  will  serve  him,  saying  :  "  This  is  God, 
and  beside  him  there  is  no  other."  And  the  greater 
number  of  those  who  shall  have  been  associated 
together  in  order  to  receive  the  Beloved  he  will  turn 
aside  after  him.  And  there  will  be  the  power  of 
miracles  in  every  city  and  region,  and  he  will  set  up 
his  image  before  him  in  every  city.  And  he  shall 
bear  sway  three  years  and  seven  months  and  twenty- 
seven  days.  And  many  believers  and  saints  having 
seen  Him  for  whom  they  were  hoping,  who  was 
crucified,  Jesus  the  Lord  Christ,  and  those  also  who 
were  believers  in  Him — of  these  a  few  in  those  days 
will  be  left  as  His  servants,  while  they  flee  from 
desert  to  desert,  awaiting  the  coming  of  the  Beloved. 
And  after  one  thousand  three  hundred  and  thirty-two 
days  the  Lord  will  come  with  His  angels  and  with  the 
armies  of  the  holy  ones  from  the  seventh  heaven,  and 
He  will  drag  Beliar  into  Gehenna  and  also  his  armies. 
And  He  will  give  rest  to  the  godly  whom  He  shall 
find  in  the  body  in  this  world  and  to  all  who  because 
of  their  faith  have  execrated  Beliar  and  his  kings.1 
Passing  from  Apostolic  times  to  the  early 
Middle  Ages,  we  find  that  the  approach  of  the 
end  of  the  world  was  still  an  absorbing  topic  of 
interest,  though  men's  ideas  now  centred  very 
largely  upon  the  anticipated  peaceful  reign  of  a 
world-ruling  earthly  monarch,  who  was  to  re- 
duce all  Christendom  to  harmony,  and  the 
contumacious  having  been  previously  extermin- 
ated, to  convert  Jews,  Turks,  and  Pagans  to  the 
acceptance  of  the  law  of  the  Gospel.  It  was 

1  Charles,  The  Ascension  of  Isaiah,  pp.  24-34. 


Adso's  Prankish  Emperor         179 

only  after  this  preliminary  period  of  peace  and 
happiness,  a  sort  of  renewal  of  the  golden  age, 
that  Antichrist  would  be  permitted  to  devastate 
and  seduce  mankind,  while  he  in  turn,  after  his 
brief  three  years  of  desolating  tyranny,  would 
be  cast  down  from  his  throne  by  St.  Michael  and 
the  angels  of  God,  who  would  at  the  same  time 
destroy  the  world  and  all  its  inhabitants  to  usher 
in  the  day  of  general  judgment.  Perhaps  the 
most  primitive  and  fundamental  presentment  of 
this  conception,  so  popular  in  the  Carolingian 
epoch,  was  that  contained  in  the  letter  of  the 
monk  Adso,  sent  in  A.D.  954  to  Queen  Gerberga, 
wife  of  Louis  IV  (Louis  d'Outremer).  The  most 
significant  passage  in  the  document  is  the 
following : 

This  is  why  the  Apostle  Paul  says  that  Antichrist 
will  not  come  into  the  world  until  rebellion  has  gone 
before — that  is  to  say,  until  all  the  kingdoms  which 
were  at  first  subject  to  the  Roman  Empire  have 
thrown  off  the  yoke. 

Now  this  time  has  not  yet  come ;  for  although  we 
see  the  Roman  Empire  in  great  part  overthrown, 
still  as  long  as  the  kings  of  the  Franks  shall  last,  who 
are  destined  to  maintain  the  Empire  of  Rome,  the 
dignity  of  the  Roman  Empire  shall  not  be  utterly 
destroyed,  because  it  will  survive  in  these  kings. 

Indeed,  some  of  our  teachers  even  say  that  a  king 
of  the  Franks  will  possess  the  entire  Roman  Empire. 
This  king  will  be  the  greatest  and  the  last  of  all 
monarchs.  And  after  having  prosperously  governed 
his  kingdom  he  will  come  in  the  end  to  Jerusalem, 


i8o          The  coming  of  Antichrist 

and  he  will  lay  down  his  sceptre  and  his  crown  upon 
the  Mount  of  Olives.  This  will  be  the  end  and 
consummation  of  the  Empire  of  Rome  and  of  Christen- 
dom. And  the  same  doctors  add  that  immediately 
afterwards,  according  to  the  before-mentioned  text 
of  the  Apostle  Paul,  the  Antichrist  will  come.1 

It  was  natural  that  with  the  anticipation  of  this 
all-conquering  and  most  religious  monarch  there 
should  in  time  come  to  be  associated  the  con- 
ception of  a  Saintly  Pope,  who  would  be  the 
ideal  of  rulers  in  the  spiritual  order,  as  the  great 
king  of  Prankish  race  was  destined  to  be  the 
ideal  of  temporal  sovereigns.  Whether  the 
Abbot  Joachim,  of  Flora,  was  really  the  author 
of  this  attractive  vision  of  a  "  Papa  Angelicus," 
as  was  afterwards  commonly  believed,  seems 
more  than  doubtful,  but  the  dream  undoubtedly 
belongs  to  the  century  of  Joachim 's  death.  In  the 
Opus  Tertium,  addressed  by  the  famous  English 
Franciscan,  Roger  Bacon,  to  Pope  Clement  IV 
in  1267,  occurs  the  following  passage  : 

For  forty  years  past  it  has  been  prophesied,  and 
many  in  visions  have  seen  the  same,  that  there  will 
be  one  Pope  in  these  our  days  (his  temporibus),  who 
will  purge  the  canon  law  and  the  Church  of  God  of 
the  quibbles  and  the  knavery  of  the  lawyers,  and  that 
justice  will  be  done  universally  without  contentious 
litigation.  And  on  account  of  the  holiness,  the  up- 
rightness, and  the  justice  of  this  Pope  it  will  come  to 
pass  that  the  Greeks  will  return  to  the  obedience  of 

1  Sackur,  Sibyllinische  Texte  und  Forschungen — Pseudo- 
Methodius,  etc.  (Halle,  1898),  p.  no. 


Friar  Roger  Bacon  1 8 1 

the  Roman  Church,  and  that  in  great  part  the  Tartars 
will  be  converted  to  the  faith  and  the  Saracens  will  be 
destroyed;  and  so  "  there  shall  be  one  fold  and  one 
shepherd,"  to  quote  the  word  which  the  prophet  had 
ringing  in  his  ears.  And  one  who  saw  these  things 
in  revelation  said  and  still  maintains  that  he  himself 
will  see  all  these  marvels  come  to  pass  in  his  own 
lifetime.1 

Roger  Bacon  had  also  clearly  heard  that  the 
reformation  of  the  Church  was  to  be  accom- 
plished by  a  great  Pope  and  a  great  King 
working  in  conjunction,  and  that  the  end  of  the 
world  was  probably  near  at  hand  ;2  still  he  does 
not  himself  assert  this.  Great  preachers  like  St. 
Vincent  Ferrer  and  Savonarola  in  the  fifteenth 
century  were  much  more  explicit  in  their  pro- 
nouncements. St.  Vincent  in  particular  for 
several  years  together  preached  throughout 
France  and  Spain,  as  a  matter,  not  of  opinion, 
but  of  certain  knowledge,  that  the  coming  of 
Antichrist  was  imminent.  Being  denounced  on 
this  account  to  Benedict  XIII  the  Pope  of  his 
obedience  (it  was  during  the  period  of  the  great 
schism)  St.  Vincent  justified  himself  to  the 
Pontiff  in  a  long  and  reasoned  statement,  in 
which  he  declared  that  "  the  time  of  Antichrist 
and  the  end  of  the  world  will  be  soon,  and  very 
soon,  and  in  exceeding  short  space  "  (cito  et 

1  F.  Rogeri  Bacon,   Opera  Inedita,  ed.  J.  S.  Brewer  (Rolls 
Series),  p.  86. 

2  16.,  pp.  403-4. 

N 


i8a          The  coming  of  Antichrist 

bene  cito  et  valde  breviter).  He  added  that  he 
was  himself  convinced  that  Antichrist  had  already 
been  born  some  time  before,  and  he  justifies 
this  belief  by  certain  miraculous  experiences  of 
his  own,  as  well  as  by  the  testimony  of  others 
and  by  the  evidence  of  the  demons  whom  he  had 
questioned  when  exorcising  possessed  persons. 
To  use  his  own  words  : 

From  all  these  facts  there  has  been  formed  in  my 
mind  an  opinion  and  a  probable  belief,  though  not 
such  as  I  can  proclaim  for  absolute  certainty,  that 
Antichrist  has  already  been  born  these  nine  years 
past.  But  as  for  the  conviction  which  I  have  already 
stated,1  to  wit,  that  soon,  quite  soon  and  very  shortly, 
the  time  of  Antichrist  and  the  end  of  the  world  will  be 
upon  us,  I  proclaim  it  everywhere  with  certainty  and 
without  misgiving,  "  the  Lord  working  with  me  and 
confirming  the  word  by  the  signs  that  follow."5 

Further,  St.  Vincent  both  said  in  his  sermons 
and  told  the  Pope  that  he  (Vincent)  himself  was 
the  angel  spoken  of  in  the  Apocalypse  (xiv.  6-7), 
who  was  sent  to  proclaim  with  a  great  voice  : 
"  Fear  God  and  give  Him  glory  for  the  hour  of 
His  judgment  is  come."2 

He  stated  also  that  when  he  announced  that 

1  He  had  previously  written,  "  Quarta  conclusio  est  quod 
tempus  Antichrist!  et  finis  mundi  erunt  cito  et  bene  cito  et 
Valde  breviter."  F.  Pages,  O.P.,  Notes  et  Documents  de 
I'Histoire  de  St.  Vincent  Ferrier  (Paris,  1905),  p.  220. 

3  Pages,  Notes  et  Documents,  p.  223. 

3  Pages,  Histoire  de  St.  Vincent  Ferrier  (Paris,  1901),  vol.  i, 
pp.  312  et  seq. 


SS.  Vincent  Ferrer  and  Norbert     183 

the  end  of  the  world  would  come  soon,  he  meant 
this  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  words  (proprie  et 
stride  loquendo),  while  contemporaries  declared 
that  he  worked  the  stupendous  miracle  of  recall- 
ing a  dead  person  to  life  to  witness  the  truth  of 
what  he  prophesied. 

But  although  all  this  happened  more  than  five 
hundred  years  ago  the  end  of  the  world  has  not 
yet  arrived.  So  again  we  learn  from  no  less  a 
person  than  St.  Bernard  of  Clairvaux  that  St. 
Norbert,  the  founder  of  the  Premonstratensians, 
prophesied  about  the  year  1128  that  the  coming 
of  Antichrist  might  be  expected  immediately. 
"  I  asked  him,"  writes  St.  Bernard,  "  what  were 
his  ideas  about  Antichrist.  He  declared  that  he 
knew  in  a  very  certain  way  that  he  would  be 
manifested  in  this  generation  (ea  quae  nunc  est 
generatione  revelandum  ilium  esse).  As  I  did 
not  share  his  belief,  I  asked  him  his  reasons,  but 
his  reply  did  not  satisfy  me."1  St.  Francis  of 
Paolo,  on  the  other  hand,  the  founder  of  the 
Minims,  in  a  most  astounding  series  of  letters  to 
a  Neapolitan  nobleman,  predicted  that  before  the 
expiration  of  400  years  (he  was  writing  in  1485) 
a  descendant  of  his  should  institute  the  last 
and  greatest  of  all  the  religious  orders,  a 
military  order  of  "Cross  bearers,"  who  would 
exterminate  all  the  Mohammedans  and  un- 
believers left  unconverted  in  the  last  age  of  the 
world.  If  we  could  put  any  confidence  in  the 

1  St.  Bernard,  Ep.  56;  Migne,  P.L.,  clxxxi,  162. 


184          The  coming  of  Antichrist 

authenticity  of  these  letters,1  the  Saint  wrote  to 
his  correspondent  in  such  terms  as  these  : 

God  Almighty  will  exalt  a  very  poor  man  of  the 
blood  of  the  Emperor  Constantine,  son  of  St.  Helena, 
and  of  the  seed  of  Pepin,  who  shall  on  his  breast  wear 
the  sign  which  you  have  seen  at  the  beginning  of  this 
letter  (+).  Through  the  power  of  the  Most  High  he 
shall  confound  the  tyrants,  the  heretics,  and  infidels. 
He  will  gather  a  grand  army,  and  the  angels  shall 
fight  for  them;  they  shall  kill  all  God's  enemies.  O 
my  Lord  !  that  man  shall  be  one  of  your  posterity, 
because  you  come  from  the  blood  of  Pepin. 
Or  again  in  another  of  the  letters  : 
MY  EXCELLENT  LORD, — Let  your  soul  rejoice !  for 
his  Divine  Majesty  manifests  through  you  such 
wonderful  signs  and  great  miracles,  according  to 
what  I,  by  God's  will,  have  often  and  again  written 
and  foretold  to  you.  One  of  your  posterity  shall 
achieve  greater  deeds  and  work  greater  wonders  than 
your  lordship.  That  man  will  be  a  great  sinner  in 
his  youth,  but  like  St.  Paul  he  shall  be  drawn  and 
converted  to  God.  He  shall  be  the  great  founder  of 
a  new  religious  order  different  from  all  the  others. 
He  shall  divide  it  into  three  classes,  namely  :  i. 
Military  knights;  2.  Solitary  priests;  3.  Most  pious 
hospitallers.  This  shall  be  the  last  religious  order  in 
the  Church,  and  it  will  do  more  good  for  our  holy 
religion  than  all  other  religious  institutes.  By  force 
of  arms  he  shall  take  possession  of  a  great  kingdom. 
He  shall  destroy  the  sect  of  Mahomet,  extirpate  all 

1  The  letters  are  printed  in  Spanish  by  Montoya,  the  historio- 
grapher of  the  Minims,  as  an  appendix  to  his  Coronica  General 
de  la  Orden  de  los  Minimos,  Madrid,  1619. 


St.  Francis  of  Paolo  185 

tyrants  and  heresies.  He  shall  bring  the  world  to  a 
holy  mode  of  life.  There  will  be  one  fold  and  one 
Shepherd.  He  shall  reign  until  the  end  of  time.  On 
the  whole  earth  there  shall  be  only  twelve  kings,  one 
emperor,  and  one  pope.  Rich  gentlemen  shall  be 
very  few,  but  all  saints.  May  Jesus  Christ  be  praised 
and  blessed ;  for  he  has  vouchsafed  to  grant  to  me,  a 
poor  unworthy  sinner,  the  spirit  of  prophecy,  not  in 
an  obscure  way  as  to  His  other  servants,  but  has 
enabled  me  to  wtite  and  to  speak  in  a  most  clear 
manner. 

That  these  letters  were  authentic  I  cannot  for  a 
moment  believe,  but  they  were  accepted  by 
Montoya  and  by  such  scholars  as  Morales, 
Cornelius  a  Lapide,  and  a  number  of  others,  and 
they  therefore  reflect  not  unfairly  the  tone  of 
mind  which  in  the  seventeenth  century  prevailed 
among  religious  people  even  with  some  pretence 
to  learning.  It  is  not  surprising,  then,  to  find 
that  such  a  mystic  as  Holzhauser,  when  inter- 
preting the  Apocalypse,  speaks  with  confidence 
of  the  long-hoped-for  epoch  of  universal 
reconciliation. 

Like  most  of  the  prophets  who  committed 
themselves  in  any  detail  to  a  picture  of  the  last 
age  of  the  world,  Holzhauser  calls  up  a  wonder- 
ful vision  of  the  peace  and  happiness  that  will 
prevail  before  the  coming  of  Antichrist.  This 
belief  may  be  traced  back  to  the  Papa  Angelicas 
of  Abbot  Joachim  or  Bacon,  and  in  nearly  all 
these  prognostics  the  ecclesiastical  and  civil 


i  86      The  coming  of  Antichrist 

powers    are    represented    as    acting    in    perfect 
accord.     Thus  the  German  mystic  writes  : 

The  sixth  period  of  the  Church — the  status  consola- 
tionis — begins  with  the  Holy  Pope  and  the  Powerful 
Emperor,  and  terminates  with  the  birth  of  Antichrist. 

This  will  be  an  age  of  solace,  wherein  God  will 
console  His  Church  after  the  many  mortifications  and 
afflictions  she  had  endured  in  the  fifth  period.  For  all 
nations  will  be  brought  to  the  unity  of  the  true  Catholic 
faith. 

A  type  of  this  period  was  the  sixth  age  of  the  old 
world,  from  the  deliverance  of  the  Israelites  out  of 
the  Babylonish  captivity,  and  the  rebuilding  of  the 
city  and  of  the  temple  of  Jerusalem,  down  to  the 
coming  of  Christ.  As  God  gladdened  His  people  by 
the  rebuilding  of  the  temple  and  of  the  holy  city ;  as 
all  kingdoms  and  nations  were  subjected  to  the  Roman 
Empire;  and  Caesar  Augustus,  the  most  powerful  and 
excellent  monarch,  after  vanquishing  all  his  enemies, 
gave  for  fifty-six  years  peace  to  the  world  :  so  will 
God  pour  out  upon  His  Church,  that  witnessed  in  the 
fifth  period  nought  but  affliction,  the  most  abundant 
consolations.  But  this  happy  age  will  be  ushered  in 
under  the  following  circumstances.  When  all  is 
desolated  with  war ;  when  the  Church  and  the  priests 
must  pay  taxes ;  when  Catholics  are  oppressed  by 
heretics  and  their  faithless  fellow-religionists;  when 
monarchs  are  murdered;  subjects  oppressed;  when 
riches  are  extirpated;  when  everything  concurs  to 
bring  about  the  establishment  of  republics,  then  will 
the  hand  of  the  Almighty  produce  a  marvellous 
change,  according  to  human  notions  seemingly  im- 
possible. For  that  strong  monarch  (whose  name  is 


Holzhauser's  Sixth  Age          187 

to  be  the  help  of  God),  will  as  the  envoy  of  the 
Almighty,  root  up  these  republics.  He  will  subject 
all  things  to  himself,  and  will  zealously  assist  the  true 
Church  of  Christ.  All  heresies  will  be  banished  into 
hell;  the  Turkish  Empire  will  be  overthrown  to  its 
foundations,  and  his  dominion  will  extend  from  east 
to  west.  All  nations  will  come,  and  will  worship  the 
Lord  in  the  one  true  Catholic  faith.  Many  righteous 
men  will  flourish,  and  many  learned  men  will  arise. 
Men  will  love  justice  and  righteousness,  and  peace 
will  dwell  on  the  whole  earth.  For  the  Omnipotent 
will  bind  Satan  for  many  years  until  the  advent  of 
him  who  is  to  come — the  son  of  perdition. 

In  respect  to  perfection,  this  period  corresponds  to 
the  sixth  day  of  creation,  on  which  God  created  man 
after  His  own  image,  and  subjected  to  him,  as  lord 
of  creation,  all  creatures  of  the  earth.  So  will  man 
be  now  a  true  image  of  God  (in  righteousness  and 
holiness),  and  the  strong  monarch  will  rule  over  all 
nations. 

The  sixth  gift  of  the  Spirit,  the  fear  of  the  Lord, 
will  in  this  period  be  poured  out  upon  the  Church ;  for 
men  will  fear  the  Lord  their  God,  keep  His  command- 
ments, and  serve  Him  with  their  whole  heart.  The 
Scriptures  will  be  understood  after  one  uniform 
fashion,  without  contradiction  and  error,  so  that  all 
will  marvel  they  had  so  long  misunderstood  the  clear 
sense  of  Holy  Writ.  The  sciences  will  be  multiplied 
and  completed,  and  men  will  receive  extraordinary 
illumination  in  natural,  as  well  as  divine  knowledge.1 

If  this  teaching  is  to  be  generally  accepted,  and 
it  has  prevailed  as  the  more  common  opinion  for 

1  Beykirch,  pp.  27-9. 


1 88        The  coming  of  Antichrist 

many  centuries,  the  immediate  coming  of  Anti- 
christ is  not  yet  to  be  feared,  for  most  assuredly 
that  age  of  grace  which  is  to  precede  his  advent 
is  still  far  off. 

At  the  same  time  among  the  multitude  of 
writers,  both  ancient  and  modern,  who  have 
treated  of  Antichrist  and  the  end  of  the  world, 
the  greatest  diversity  of  view  prevails,  not  only 
with  regard  to  the  time  of  the  second  coming  of 
the  Son  of  man,  but  also  with  regard  to  the 
character  and  order  of  those  occurrences  which 
are  to  herald  His  approach.  The  quaint  legend 
prevalent  in  the  later  Middle  Ages,  which  re- 
counted the  whole  history  of  Antichrist  from  his 
portentous  birth  to  his  destruction  at  Jerusalem, 
together  with  the  marvellous  preaching  of  Enoch 
and  Elias  (identified  with  the  two  "  witnesses  " 
of  Apoc.  xi.  3-12),  is  not  now,  of  course,  accepted 
with  the  same  unquestioning  faith  as  formerly ; 
but  the  belief  in  a  personal  Antichrist  seems  still 
to  be  general  amongst  those  who  incline  to  a 
conservative  interpretation  of  Holy  Scripture.1 
The  late  Cardinal  Newman  pointed  out  long  ago 
in  his  essay  on  "  The  Patristical  Idea  of  Anti- 
christ," published  as  one  of  the  Tracts  for  the 
Times  in  1838,  that  it  was  the  universal  tradition 
of  the  early  Church  "  that  Antichrist  is  one  in- 
dividual man,  not  a  power — not  a  mere  ethical 

1  The  Abbe*  A.  Chauffard,  for  example,  published  several 
books  in  1893  and  1894  dealing  with  the  coming  of  Antichrist, 
the  best  known  of  which  perhaps  is  La  Revelation  de  S.  Jean 
et  le  prochain  grand  regne  de  I'Eglise,  Paris,  1894.  On  the  other 


The  Diana  Vaughan  Myth  189 
spirit  or  a  political  system,  not  a  dynasty  or  suc- 
cession of  rulers  ' ' ;  and  in  reprinting  this  essay 
in  1872,  he  added  nothing  to  indicate  that  his 
views  on  this  matter  had  undergone  any  change. 
The  question  cannot  be  discussed  here,  but  it 
may  be  noted  that,  as  in  the  days  of  St.  Vincent 
Ferrer,  so  of  recent  years  the  belief  in  the  near 
coming  of  a  personal  Antichrist  has  led,  especially 
at  times  of  religious  unrest,  to  many  extrava- 
gances of  superstition  and  credulity.  It  will  be 
remembered  that  the  most  objectionable  features 
of  the  Diana  Vaughan  myth  were  cunningly 
devised  by  Leo  Taxil  to  trade  on  this  common 
expectation  of  pious  Catholics.  But  even 
among  those  who  regard  the  Apocalypse  as  an 
entirely  prophetic  document,  there  still  remains 
the  widest  divergence  of  view  with  regard  to  its 
chronology,  and  it  may  be  noted  that  a  learned 
Dominican,  Pere  Gallois,  writing  some  years  ago 
in  the  Revue  Biblique*  not  only  argues  in  favour 
of  a  modified  Millenarianism,  but  supposes  that 
this  thousand  years  of  peace  in  the  Church  is  to 
follow,  not  to  precede,  the  period  of  Antichrist's 
dominion.  In  all  this  confusion  and  conflict  of 
opinion  the  only  thing  upon  which  we  can  lay 

hand,  I  may  note  that  Colonel  J.  L.  Ratton,  who,  after  two 
previous  apocalyptic  works,  published  in  1912  a  book  called 
The  Apocalypse  of  St.  John,  which  is  dedicated  to  Cardinal 
Bourne,  deprecates  the  idea  of  "  an  anthropomorphic  Anti- 
christ," remarking  that  "  Antichrist  is  a  movement,  not  a 
man  "  (p.  252). 

1  See  the  Revue  Biblique,  1893,  pp.  384-430  and  506-43  ;  1894, 
PP-  357-74- 


1 90      The  coming  of  Antichrist 

stress  with  any  sense  of  security  is  that  utter- 
ance of  our  Saviour,  the  very  language  of 
which  conveys  so  marked  an  emphasis  :  "  But 
of  that  day  or  hour  no  man  knoweth,  neither  the 
angels  in  heaven,  nor  the  Son,  but  (only)  the 
Father  "  (Mark  xiii.  32). 

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THURSTON,  HERBERT 


AUTHOR 


ThwRWar  and  the  Prophets 


TITLE 


ROOM 


THtHSTCN,  HERBERT  D 

524 
The  War  and  the  Prophets.     .T55